


Will You Be Home For Christmas?

by pumpkinbloods



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, But Michelle is sad!!, Character Study, Christmas Time!!, Cindy Moon is a good bro, Complete, F/M, Flash is a dick, Hurt/Comfort, I hate myself, Michelle Jones Needs a Hug, Mr Harrington is a mess wow, Ned Leeds is a Good Bro, Not really a Christmas Fic, Peter Parker is a stupid fuck, Sharp Objects, Slight trigger warning, The Polar Express (2004), This too shall pass, Wakes & Funerals, also this is an AU, and they haven't even hugged yet, but it's fine, civil war ended better, i didnt mean for it to be, kudos n comments make my heart go whOOSh, might not make sense but it also does?, no longer a work in progress, one second im writing an intro, so i can do, some fluff ig, supportive family, the next i'm ten thousand words in, this is a slow burn, this is way more angsty than i'm letting on, whatever the fuck i want - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-23
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2019-09-25 03:13:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 65,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17113382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pumpkinbloods/pseuds/pumpkinbloods
Summary: Michelle Jones life could be described as some sort of Christmas story. Not the story itself, not the Red Ryder air rifle with the “you’ll shoot your eye out!” or the way Frank Cross saw all the ghosts and changed his life, or the way Buddy’s dad found the Christmas spirit. Not the way The Grinch learned how to be happy and love, or the way the Conductor on the Polar Express told the kids about how some of the most real things are the things the world cannot see.Or,Michelle has her own battles. The inner turmoil that she felt everytime Peter Parker looked her way was one of them.





	1. THE TREE IS ON FIRE AND I AM SCREAMING

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you all enjoy this, I worked so hard on it!! have fun reading!
> 
> my tumblr is @exlosers

_You keep calling yourself empty_ _/ And you're starting to_ ** _believe_** _it._

_Neil Hilborn_

 

 

There are good days.

 

Days where she can get out of bed. Days where she is excited to live. Days where there is not a deep black cloud following her around.

 

But there are also bad days.

 

Days where she stares blankly at the wall. Days where everything feels and tastes and looks the same. Days where she feels like the world is slowly losing a hold of her.

 

Michelle Jones grew up with a good family. Had a younger sister and their parents loved them both deeply. Her parents wanted the best for them, so her father was gone for work quite often and her mother had a part-time job and the other half of her life was spent trying to find herself and who she is.

 

Michelle Jones life could be described as some sort of Christmas story. Not the story itself, not the Red Ryder air rifle with the “you’ll shoot your eye out!” or the way Frank Cross saw all the ghosts and changed his life, or the way Buddy’s dad found the Christmas spirit. Not the way The Grinch learned how to be happy and love, or the way the Conductor on the Polar Express told the kids about how some of the most real things are the things the world cannot see.

 

Her life was everything that made up the stories. The tangled and burnt out Christmas lights, the tiny porcelain villages, the homemade ornaments. The scenes in between the more important ones. The music throughout the house and the Christmas specials of your favorite sitcom. How, at home on Christmas, surrounded by family, around people who are supposed to always; _always_ be there for you…

 

You still feel out of place.

 

Mr. and Mrs. Jones loved their children. But as Michelle grew up, as she was able to do more, she started to feel her parents slightly vanish.

 

Her parents were the parents in the Polar Express or any Christmas movie like that. There when the plot needed it, but otherwise they were just sort of ghosts roaming Michelle’s head.

 

Michelle never really had _friends._ Sure, she had people she hung out with. People she went to the mall with, people who made half-hearted Instagram posts on her birthday. But she never called those people at four am when sleep just wouldn’t come. She never called those people when she took a break from the meds, she never called those people when something bad happened. They were friends, but not anything close.

 

Michelle Jones grew up in New York City. The setting for every Christmas movie ever, and each Christmas Eve when her family went to her grandmother’s to spend the evening she would sneak out right before they opened presents, where almost all the adults were nearly drunk, she would go out on the front porch and watch the snowfall. Her grandmother lived in a big old house, with a large front porch that had a bright pink porch swing. It would always be covered in snow when Michelle went out there. But she had a long coat that covered the better part of her long legs. She would watch the snow, listen to the faint laughter and Christmas songs from her house (and other houses too). Michelle would do this because it was peaceful. It was just something to keep her mind busy because she was too young to drink and too old to play dolls.

 

Michelle was the child who had to get the tangled lights from the cramped storage space. Her father had always insisted on having big lights like in “Christmas Vacation” her mother always cooked sugar cookies with Michelle and her sister. They bought gingerbread houses from the store and made them, but never ate them.

 

Peter was there at the store when they were buying things for Christmas food. Michelle was following her mother without a question. Michelle was pushing the cart, her mother would mumble things to herself. When they went to check out Michelle went to look at the Redbox movies.

 

Today was a decent day. She got out of bed before noon, got dressed by two. She finished her homework, but she did stare at the wall in her room for nearly an hour. Cindy Moon, a girl that Michelle had been somewhat connecting with for the past few weeks; called her. They didn’t have much to talk about, but neither hung up. Just listening to the to other breathe, knowing they weren’t alone.

 

Michelle Jones was fine. She was fine until she couldn’t remember the last time she laughed a real laugh. She was fine until she couldn’t remember the last time she was _this_ bad. She was fine until she wasn’t. Until her lights blew up and her tiny porcelain villages got destroyed and her ornaments cracked. Fine until she stopped living and started to stare at the wall all day.

 

Michelle didn’t mind Peter Parker. Made fun of him and Ned noticed things about him. But she wasn’t obsessed, she really wasn’t. She really _was_ just observant. Michelle noticed things about nearly everyone she met, Flash had a secret ear piercing. Betty loved fantasy books and she often would come to school early to hang out in the library and read. Ned had liked Betty since he set eyes on her. Betty was oblivious. Her art teacher read dirty romance novels. Michelle saw things, she saw things and she hid things. She noticed people and they didn’t notice her.

 

Peter sat right next to her once, it was raining and the lunchroom smelled awful. Michelle was rereading ‘Sharp Objects’ the book was dark and disturbing. The best books always were, her father said.

 

“Why do you write in your books?” he asked. God, that idiot. That stupid fuck. “So if they ever go missing, people will know my favorite lines.” Michelle had answered. Peter had nodded, then went back to sit with Ned. And Michelle was glad, glad he didn’t stay longer. Glad he left, glad that Peter didn’t notice the only highlighted quote in the whole damn book. _“Sometimes it is all too loud.”_

 

Michelle had accidentally cut herself on a broken ornament. She stood there, in front of her tiny Christmas tree she kept in her room, watching the blood leak down her ring finger. When the blood hit her palm, she cleaned the small cut.

 

Her mother called Michelle over when they were done checking out. Michelle helped her mother carry the bags out to their jeep, plastic bag handles digging into her flesh. It’s snowing, but the snow melts the moment it hits the ground. When her mother opens the trunk door, Michelle sighs a shaky breath. Her mother gives Michelle the keys and tells her to start the car. While she is walking to the front of the car she sees Peter Parker. He is with, who Michelle assumes to be his aunt, walking across the parking lot. Michelle watches as she slowly starts opening the door, to her horror; Peter looks over at her.

 

This was the point where Michelle says they had a connection, where he was _the one._  But she didn’t feel much for him. They made eye contact, faintly Michelle felt one of the needles on her tree fall off; then Michelle got into the car and turned on the heat

 

The next day is a bad day. It’s Monday, and she has to be at school. But her legs will not move, her eyes will not stray away from her white wall. On most bad days Michelle Jones can get out of bed. She can _move,_ but today? She feels like there are people inside of her chest planting roses so she cannot breathe. She feels like there is a black _force_ keeping her in bed, pinning her chest down, making her skin go cold and grow goosebumps. On most bad days Michelle Jones can still live, but today everything seems to freeze.

 

Michelle felt like that scene in Scrooged where Frank is stuck in time or in a tunnel and he sees someone he used to know dead. He sees their frozen body, and how the music becomes eerie and how even from the comfort from your own home; you can still feel a chill.

 

So Michelle tells her father about how fucking sick she feels, how everything hurts. And this isn’t completely a lie, but it isn’t the total truth either. Her father calls Michelle in sick, then kisses her clammy forehead and goes off to work. She faintly hears her phone ring, knowing it was Cindy or Betty; Michelle ignored it.

 

It was late November, the clouds were covering the sun and everything felt gloomy. _“Good”,_ Michelle thought, _“good. They all deserve this."_ Who were they? Michelle wasn’t sure, but whoever they were deserved this. She watched the same episode of ‘Modern Family’ at least eight times because she couldn’t focus. Michelle eventually moves from her bedroom to the kitchen floor. It’s hard tile and quite uncomfortable, but she needs that today. She lays on the floor staring up at the bright kitchen light, wondering how many bugs have died up there.

 

Ned calls her, so does Cindy and Betty. She remembers that they have a meet on Saturday and this week is the last week to practice. It’s funny how Michelle doesn’t care very much. She just listens to their voicemails, texts them a half-hearted “I’m sorry” and goes back to staring at the dimming bulb.

 

Her father won’t get home until late, her mother is out with her friends for a book club or whatever and her sister is at theater practice then afterward she will be going to her friends’ to work on homework. Or at least this is what the group chat Michelle has with her family says. They all ask if Michelle is okay to be home alone. Each time she repeats that it’s honestly fine.

 

Ned shows up at her house. Michelle is wearing a Christmas sweater and boxers she wears to bed and around the house. She answers the door and Ned looks nervous.

 

 _( She looks tired,_ Ned thinks. Hair a mess and dark circles under her eyes. She seems skinner too, she was always skinny. _But now, right now she looks like someone just pulled out parts of her life and dragged them out of her throat_ )

 

“What do you want, Leeds?” Michelle asked, hoping her voice sounded mean. She was sure it just sounded jagged and tired.

 

“We were worried about you,” Ned answers. Then he hands her a folder. “It’s our homework. I thought you might want it.” then he turns around and starts to walk away.

 

“Ned?” she calls out to him. He turns around. “I don’t hate you. And thanks for the homework.” then Michelle shuts the door and goes to the living room to lay on the floor.

 

All her ornaments were breaking, her tree was rotting and the lights were blowing up. The food for Christmas dinner kept being burnt and the wrapped paper sucked at covering the presents.

 

Her father gets home an hour later than normal, her mom picks up her sister on the way home. Her family walks in to see Michelle Jones laying on the floor in between the kitchen and living room. Michelle is staring at the ceiling while the same song plays over and over again. Her father scoops Michelle off the floor and brings her into her room. Her mother covers her with a quilt and her sister puts some water by Michelle’s bed. They know the process now, they know how to glue the ornaments, how to fix the lights, how to keep the dinner from burning.

 

Michelle seems to sleep until the next day because she wakes up and the sun is rising. Her family is already gone, but there is a note by her bed and they have sent text messages. Michelle rereads the words over and over, how they say it’s alright for her to stay home. That she’ll be okay, they have an appointment tomorrow. Michelle just texts back a thank you, then she goes back to sleep.

 

Michelle stays home until Thursday, people make comments. Flash threatens to pull her hair out and Michelle gives him the meanest look she can manage. Then when Flash says, “you were probably just gone fucking someone.”

 

Michelle loses her mind in three quick thoughts.

 

One: The whole team is there, Mr. Harrington and a new assistant teacher. They are all there, watching as Michelle loses her mind and her face blossoms into a rosy shade of pink.

 

Two: Everything's on fire. The tree is on fire, the ornaments going with it. The dinner is burning in the oven and the lights were becoming tiny explosions. Everything was red. Her knuckles from the blood, her face from the blush, her anger from the last sixteen years of her life. Red and on fire and so much blood.

 

Three: She is already nearly insane. There is no going back now. She dived head first in the shallow end. She danced with the devil in the pale moonlight. She is Girl, Interrupted at her Music. She is _gone._ So what is her tilting a little more off the axis. What is she besides a little girl who was too scared to go into the homemade haunted house with her aunt on Halloween?

 

The first thing she hears is a loud _thump_ and a groan in pain. Then someone is by her side, Flash is screaming swear words at Michelle. When her vision comes back she looks down at her knuckles and they are covered in fresh iron blood. There is a cut on her middle finger from a ring she wears all the time. Ned is suddenly next to her, looking into her dying brown eyes whispering “Run. Go. Before the principle comes.”

 

Michelle is out of the school before anyone realizes she is gone, Peter wasn’t at practice again today Michelle thinks. Running is tiring on her willowy frame and her heavy book filled backpack isn’t helping. Her heartbeat is louder than the sounds of the busy New York street. Michelle won’t get home before Flash gets on his feet and chases her down. He is in track after all. When Michelle hears a fast car race down the street she ducks into an ally to catch her breath. She drops her bag and falls onto the dirty ground. She does not cry, she will not cry. But she sits on the floor for god knows how long waiting for someone to swallow her whole.

 

Soon enough Michelle is on her feet, walking to the bus stop trying to blend in. She hears her joints crack her Christmas Story fire starts to go down. The bus doesn’t get there soon enough for her so she starts to walk home.

 

Michelle is hit by a blast of warm air on her cold body when she opens her front door. No one is home, nor will anybody be home for a while. Her mother will be home around midnight, her sister is spending the night at a friend and her father is out of town for work.

 

Michelle falls asleep early that night. She falls asleep on the living room floor and around one am her mother covers her with a blanket.

Peter Parker knocks on her door the next day, Michelle is still wearing the clothes from yesterday and her knuckles still have blood on them. Her mother got a call from the school, about the fight. Michelle is suspended for three days starting Monday. Michelle still doesn’t go to school the next day. She wonders how many rumors have been started about her.

 

Mrs. Jones stayed home that day, with her daughter. Michelle said nothing about it.

 

“Hi, MJ,” Peter states shortly.

 

“What do you need Peter?” she asks, knowing her voice is raspy. Knowing she looks tired and sad. Knowing she looks like a smudged version of herself.

 

“I was just wondering if you’re okay. You weren’t at school today and I heard about yesterday.” Peter speaks, and Michelle wants to punch him. She really does.

 

“I’m fine, Parker. Fine. I hit Flash yesterday because I wanted too, bye.” She starts to close the door, then Peter puts his hand on it. She underestimated this strength.

 

“Why’d you do it? Hit Flash, I mean.” Peter asks. And Michelle sighs then opens the door again. She does not let him in.

 

“Because I’m crazy,” Michelle says slightly smirking, leaning against the door frame. Peter is shorter than her, Michelle is grateful for this.

 

“Wow. Okay. Um, well. Be okay, I guess. Be okay.” then Peter waves at her and walks away. Michelle is sick of people walking down her walkway, Michelle is sick of her Christmas story.

 

She doesn’t call him back. Doesn’t yell out for him. She watches as he walks away, then shuts the front door. Her mother tells her to take a shower and put on some clean clothes. She does. Her sister comes home a few hours after Peter leaves. Her father won’t be home for another week, but he calls before dinner. And before bed. And on Saturday morning. Her father seemed to care.

 

Michelle was never behind in school, and being suspended didn’t leave her behind either. She finishes her homework, the weekend before her suspension even starts. So the three days she is off, gone. Michelle sits in front of her front door, she sets up a small bed. With blankets and pillows and her laptop. She starts with the first episode of How I Met Your Mother. By the end of the day, she has made it to the start of the end of the second season.  Her sister comes home and finds Michelle on the floor in the living room.

 

Michelle looks so tired it pains her sister. She looks dead. Michelle really does. She looks so gone and out of it, Cole, her sister, feels a pain in her own chest.

 

“Michelle? How do you feel?” Cole asks. She walks into the living room and drops her bookbag. She sits down on the floor next to her sister, Michelle lolls her head to look at Cole. Her eyes are tired and a misplaced curl hangs in front of her face.

 

“Fine,” Michelle responds. She sits up quickly and throws the blankets off of herself, runs a hand through her hair. Cole watches as she makes her way to the bathroom. The door locks, Cole hears the water run.

 

Michelle Jones opens the drawer, scissors with blue handles greet her. Michelle doesn’t cut her hair often, and when she does she goes to her mothers' friend. Michelle ties her hair back and cuts off the ponytail. The sound of cutting hair wakes her up, but she doesn’t stop. Hair falls down her sweater and it itches. But it’s shorter now, still curly but shorter. Uneven most likely, messy but shorter. Her mother will be mad, it doesn’t matter right now.

 

Michelle takes a shower, strips herself of clothing and steps in the shower. There is a crack in the wall above the shower, it’s been there since they moved in. Once Michelle stood on the shower curb or whatever, holding herself up with what the thing shower curtain hangs on. She doesn’t know the name of it. Michelle traced the crack in the ceiling, holding herself up on the bar with one hand. The crack is bumpy against her smooth fingertips. Then she falls.

 

Her foot slips, causing Michelle to fall back and take the bar along with her, the bar falls are her waist. She had a nasty bruise for nearly three weeks. She remembers the pain, the shock of it all. The pure oddness of it all, now Michell sits in the shower. Lets the water consume her, hit her hollow body. Raises her hands above her head to feel the uneven water hit them. Like a prayer to her sadness, to the pipes of water. Sometimes Michelle thinks that the shower head is sick of her, of the sadness. Telling Michelle to whisper her secrets to the cotton swabs or shampoo bottles for the shower head is too tired of Michelle's’ cries.

 

Michelle once took a hot glue gun and shot at her hand. It came out slowly, the way she wanted it to. Her mother had her back turned, making Christmas ornaments. When it hit her hands, the hot glue staining the top of her hands. Michelle had quietly gasped mouth opening and whining. Her mother turned at the noise, hissing her name and dragging Michelle by the wrist to the sink. Damping her mocha hand with cool, clear water. Michelle swears she hears a scream. Maybe it was her own.

 

The room is surprisingly cold when the hot water runs out and Michelle forces herself out of the shower. Covers herself in an orange towel, wipes down the foggy mirror. Her hand impulsively goes up and feels the irregular edges of hair. It’s refreshing, to have it gone. To do something without it destroying her more. Michelle hears the shower head cry for her to close the plastic curtain, she does.

 

She goes back to school the next week, hair shorter wearing a t-shirt she got from women's march. Ned is alone in the morning, one headphone in and he looks alone. Worried. So Michelle plants herself in front of him, backpack oh her shoulders and shorter hair down. Phone tucked into her pockets and drinking water from the water bottle her mother got for her last Christmas. Nearly a year ago.

 

“Where’s Peter?” she asked, head bowed like she is praying. Whispering at nothing but herself and whatever may come when her question gets answered.

 

“He’s gone, again. The internship… he normally says goodbye. May has already called me telling me he’ll be back soon, but Peter isn’t here. He seems to be wiped off the planet, even though he’s not. I know he’s not. But he’s not here, didn’t even say goodbye,” Ned finishes, bitterly.

 

Ned is never mad at Peter, not once, since Michelle had known them, have they been in a fight. She met them for the first time in third grade, Ned and Peter during recess, staying inside, working on LEGO and drinking Caprisun while listening to music the teacher let them play. Ned and Peter in middle school, acne and growth spurts as Michelle grew into her body. Ned and Peter in freshman year, Peter getting a whole new wardrobe because he grew out of all his clothes. Peter disappearing for two weeks then coming back with bruises and a new Stark Tech smartphone. Ned and Peter in sophomore year, whispering during PE and lunch. Talking about Liz Allan, then Liz’s father being caught by Spider-Man right after Peter left Homecoming. Ned and Peter this year, coming over to Michelle’s house to make sure she’s alright. Peter being gone and Ned missing him. Peter being gone and Ned being angry about it.

 

“Your hair is shorter,” Ned says, snapping her out of her daze. Michelle touches the tips of it, her mother had said nothing about her hair. She gazed at it for a minute or so, then walked out of the room. Saying nothing, taking the daughter she always secretly wanted with her.

 

“Yeah, I cut it.”

 

Michelle has his number, from decathlon. She has the whole teams, and she hardly texts them. They have a group chat that they don’t use often, and since Michelle punching Flash; the group chat got even quieter.

 

She calls him, and he picks up after the fourth ring.

 

“Michelle? Why are you calling me?” Peter asks, there’s a loud noise in the background. She hears someone yell Kid and then yell Peter.

 

“It’s December nineteenth, Parker. Ned misses you, your aunt probably does too. You should be here, with your family.”

 

“Michelle, you don’t understand. They’ll see me soon, this… internship is huge for me,” Peter says like it’s easy. Like it means nothing. Like his life is not what it used to be.

 

“I don’t give a fuck, Parker. Ned is mad at you. Is Ned ever mad at you? You need to come back. I don’t care if you’re hanging out with all of the Avengers or if you have your own goddamn room in the tower or whatever. Come back, Peter. Come back,” she’s ashamed that her voice breaks. She’s ashamed that this is her life. That she is asking Peter Parker to come back because Ned is lonely and Michelle doesn’t want to see that. That her Christmas story is becoming bigger and bigger each and every moment.

 

“Michelle…”

 

“Whatever, Parker. I don’t have time for your bullshit,” Michelle fumes. She knows he would’ve just made an excuse. She almost hangs up, almost.

 

“Michelle, wait!” Peter yells into the phone, Michelle gently puts the phone back to her ear.

 

“What?”

 

“I’ll explain everything when I get back, I swear I will. You’ll understand. Michelle? Are you still there?” Peter asks, and Michelle wishes he would just come back. Go back to being the old Peter that stayed inside for recess and drank Caprisun and listened to the soundtrack to The Breakfast Club.

 

“Peter,” Michelle whispered, voice hoarse and tired.

 

“Will you be home for Christmas?”

 

Peter sighed, heavy, too heavy for a kid. A child, a teenager who still builds LEGO. A boy who comes to school late and leaves early. A boy who is under the wing of Tony fucking Stark. A boy who yelled at Flash once for slapping a girls ass. A boy who checked on Michelle when she was far too sad to even call herself a living person. A boy, and it hits her like cold air hits her when she leaves the house in the middle of winter, who is Spider-man.

 

She knows, everything falls into place. The puzzle complete. The music is fading but the noise is louder than ever. It’s _why_ Peter and Ned had been whispering. It’s _why_ Peter left Homecoming. It’s _why_ Ned is worried. It’s _why_ Peter suddenly got an internship at Starks. It’s  _why_ Peter got so buff and got a whole new set of stupid nerdy t-shirts and sweaters. It’s _why_ he left class all the time. It’s _why_ he came to school with bruises and sore feet and wrists. It’s _why_ Peter was the way he was, fucked up and couldn’t walk home without worrying about someone else. Why he acted the way he did, why he did the bullshit he did. It’s the answer to Peter, maybe not to life, maybe not to why Michelle was sad all the time, maybe not to why Ned wouldn’t ask out Betty.

 

It wasn’t the answer to life, nor would it ever be. But it was enough, this was  _enough._

 

“I’ll be back soon, MJ,” Peter spoke. Someone in the background called his name, Michelle felt like crying. She leans her head back and looks up at the graying sky. It stopped snowing shortly after lunch, the winter chill runs through her leggings.

 

“You should be here now, Peter. Right now. You shouldn’t be gone when people need you the most.”

 

He’ll be home for Christmas. He’ll be home soon.

 

There are good days, Michelle reminds herself. There are good days, good days. But there are also bad days. So very bad days.

 

“MJ!” Peter calls from across the parking lot the next day. Stepping out of a Stark limousine. He runs fast to catch up with Michelle. “Your hair is shorter.”

 

She nods lamely, looks past him at the black limousine currently pulling away and out of the school parking lot. Peter smiles at her, something breaks inside of Michelle’s heart. The wall between her Christmas story and her real life is getting destroyed with sledgehammers. Busting down and creating tears in her paper world.

 

It hurts, it does. Michelle bends over in pain, howling in sorrow. She shoots her eye out, the procaine villages are being thrown at the wall and shattering. Her tree is in flames, the lights are being tied around her legs to keep her from walking. The dinner is rotten and black. The presents are empty, the music is far too loud. She cannot see. Everything is blurry with tears and tinsel.

 

“Michelle?”

 

“I know you’re Spider-man, Parker.”

 


	2. THE HOLIDAYS HAVE ALWAYS BEEN RED RED RED

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> second chapter whoop! hope y'all enjoy!!

****Peter backs into a parked car, stumbling over words. Some seniors are looking over at them and whispering. Michelle watches Peter Parker, Spider-man, savor of Queens, look absolutely petrified over her own few words.

 

The laughter comes over her in a wave, starts at her feet and works its way up her body. She breaks into a fit of hollow laughter, loud and ugly. Peter stares at her like she just fell from the sky. It takes her a while to collect herself, her sanity, her calm. Peter stands in front of Michelle the whole time, wondering _why_ she did this. Not two days ago she was pleading for him to come back, that _people_ need him. Now she stands in front of him, doubled over in laughter.

 

She doesn’t apologize, she stands up and looks at him. The ghost of a smile on her face, hands clinging to her backpack straps and cheeks slightly red from the cold. Peter is the first to break eye contact, with one question, “how long have you known?”

 

Michelle shrugs, looks around her. Bits of melted snow and ice lay around the parking lot. Unpure snow covered with black dirt and some freshman sliding around on the ice. Laughing and pushing each other, Michelle got caught up in her own head. Wondering when one would fall, and scream and the other would say sorry. Begging for the fallen one to say nothing. She turns back to Peter, eyes unfocused and ornaments hanging on his eyelashes. “Not long, but come to think of it, I probably should’ve found out earlier.”

 

Peter winces, head falling back to look up at the sky. “Are you going to tell anybody?”

 

Michelle is taken aback, anger blooms from inside her chest. Eyes narrow, full of liquid anger, she takes a step towards Peter Parker. “No, I won’t tell anyone. Expect more from me, Peter.”

 

She turns around and stalks over to the doors. The tipping point, the water bubbling over, the family yelling at Kevin for being the way he is. Home Alone, alone on this earth. Lonely in her skin, lonely in her own head. Flashing memories before her, young children using her ribcage as a jungle gym.

 

The day goes by in a blur, she ignores Peter. Reads during gym, sits with Cindy Moon during lunch. They read next to each other, sharing headphones. Cindy keeps drinking Michelle’s tea but Michelle doesn't say anything about it. It’s nice, to have this pattern, this person, this friend sitting next to her. Closing her book halfway through lunch and leaning her head on Michelle’s shoulder. Peter keeps glimpsing over at them, and each time Cindy gives him a dirty look.

 

Cindy walks home with Michelle, they watch Spider-man fly across buildings. He looks right at Michelle and Cindy, before nodding and disappearing from view. Cindy doesn’t say a word about it, they all have secrets.

 

Cindy leaves at nine, getting a ride home from her older sister. Michelle stands on the front steps watching as Cindy waves and leaves. She stays on the front steps until Cole comes out and makes her older sister come inside from the cold.

 

Michelle listens to music in her bedroom, her sister filling up her water bottle downstairs in the kitchen. Her mother and father in the living room, Michelle leaves her door unlocked. Cole calls out a goodnight from the hallway, and Michelle hopes her voice is loud enough to drift out the hallway.

 

The music all sounds the same, song after song. Michelle half expects someone to come out of her closet and yell at her. Screaming, telling her to be alive. Telling her to stop waiting for the story to end. To breathe and to talk and to stop acting like life is something that can be redone.

 

Michelle watched her phone ring that night, Riptide playing as Peter’s name appears on her phone. She doesn’t pick up the phone, it stops ringing. The music had stopped playing, so it’s just Michelle, sitting alone in her room. Wanting to sleep and at the same time wanting to stay awake, wanting everything and nothing all at once. _Feeling_ everything and nothing all at once.

 

The rest of the school week, like most of Michelle Jones life, goes by in a blur. It's like looking at her life through a glass of water. The decathlon holiday party, avoiding Peter, some _friends_ shooting her worried looks. Mr. Harrington asking if she’s alright, reading, her family. Then it’s Christmas break and the Christmas tree in her living room has presents under it. Her _own_ Christmas tree is not on fire, but it’s not pretty. It’s just there, sitting in the house of her mind, covered in blown lights and broken ornaments. Her family goes to a Christmas party at her fathers’ bosses house.

 

Everything is gold and silver. Lights and mistletoe hang around the house, the Christmas tree, oh so tall and shines brightly in the corner of the room. The bosses son, nearly twenty, talks to Michelle. Looks at her like she is something to be devoured, Michelle ducks out of the room and finds an empty staircase that goes to the basement. She sits down, peels off her heels and takes out a few bobby pins that were poking the back of her head. Her mother won’t be pleased, even though Mrs. Jones loved her daughter dearly and thought the world of her; it did not mean that Michelle was the daughter she dreamed about having as a young girl.

 

It’s the twenty-second, on the twenty-fourth Michelle and her family will go to her fathers' mothers house. Michelle finds Peter’s contact.

 

Christmas music plays in the background, her head throbs from an empty stomach and her feet seem to be numbing from the heels her mother forced her to wear. The dress she wears is black, with matching black high heels with snowflakes on them. She has a sheer kimono, her parents always made Cole and Michelle dress up for Christmas parties. Her father had a reputation to uphold, they said.

 

Michelle holds her breath when she hears people walking by the staircase, hand hovering over the call button. Wondering if she was willing to remake her Christmas dinner, to buy new lights, to redecorate her tree. She _is_ willing, but Michelle doesn’t know that.

 

Not yet.

 

There is a cheer from the living room, then two people are singing Baby It’s Cold Outside as a duet. Michelle pushes the call button, listening to it ring. The singers have nice voices, Michelle can tell it’s two girls. One is younger than the other, and Michelle wonders if it is a daughter and her mother singing together. Peter picks up after twenty-eight seconds. “Michelle?”

 

“I’m not going to tell anyone, I promise. Just,” she drags out, sighing. Looking at her painted nails, forcing herself to not pick at them. Normally, Michelle keeps her nails long and unpainted. _Like a man,_ her grandmother said. After that, Michelle wore hoop earrings to prove to her grandmother that she could be good. She could be a girl, a girl who doesn’t burn the tree, who doesn’t fuck up the dinner, who doesn’t smash the ornaments with a hammer. “Be safe, I guess. You’re one of the best on the team.”

 

Peter chuckles breathlessly, she wonders if he is nodding. It takes Michelle a piercing moment to realize that there are heels clicking on the hardwood floor on the top of the staircase. Michelle sits at the bottom, mostly hidden in the dark. She whips herself to look behind her, to see Cole, in a red dress, one that had laces in the back that her mother had tied before Cole did her makeup. Red dress, black heels, and golden necklace Cole got from their uncle on her birthday. “Michelle?” Cole called down the steps.

 

“I’ll be safe,” Peter promises. And Michelle sighs, whispers in the phone, “thank you.” Then she hangs up, grabs her heels and walks up the steps. Uses the wall to slip on her heels and fixes her hair in the reflection of her phone.

 

( _I don’t look like a human,_ Michelle thinks. _I look like something that was just pulled out of the ice. Something that is still thawing._ )

 

“They’re putting out the dessert. There’s strawberry cheesecake, I know that’s your favorite,” Cole informs her older sister. And this, this act of kindness, this thing that Cole knows about Michelle lights up the whole house inside of Michelle’s head. Brightest on the block, just by strawberry cheesecake and her sister actually finding Michelle to tell her. It is this, this simple act of sisterhood love that makes Michelle smile, that makes the party worth going to.

 

(Cole is glad she knows that strawberry cheesecake is Michelle's favorite. Is glad she knows that Michelle hides on the bottom of the steps every time they go to this mans house. Is glad she knows to not yell, but to call out to Michelle. Cole is glad that she can just tell Michelle that there is cheesecake to let Michelle knows she _does_ care. In fact, Cole cares so much it burns her skin when Michelle disappears during parties. _Because what if Michelle is hurting herself more?_ )

 

They eat dessert, drink eggnog without alcohol. Michelle ignores the stabbing pain in her feet, ignores the bosses son who looks at her from across the room, ignores the ringing in her head telling her to take the dinner out of the oven. In the back of Michelle’s mind, for half a second, she wonders how many trees she has set fire to. How many dinners she has ruined, how many new strings of lights she has had to buy. How many times she has redone Christmas. But that thought is pushed away and put into a present that will never be opened.

 

The Jones family doesn’t leave until nearly midnight, and when they do the bosses son tries to give Michelle a hug. Michelle goes to her fathers' side to keep herself from being eaten alive. In the car on their way home, Michelle and Cole sitting in the back seat. Her father driving and her mother sitting in the passengers seat, Christmas music playing from the radio. Street lights flashing on the ice, her father tapping the on the steering wheel and her mother on Facebook. Cole laying down somehow in the backseat, heels taken off and sitting on the floor. Her father looks at Michelle through the rearview mirror, smiles sadly.

 

Michelle loves her parents, she truly does. They care for her, keep a roof over her head, supported Michelle through every high and low. Loved her for who she was, is and will be. But sometimes, sometimes- Michelle wonders how much better her parents lives would be without Michelle. How much better off they would be without this constantly cracked daughter. Without Michelle and every war she brought with her presence.

 

Michelle falls asleep wearing her makeup, stripped from her dress and heels throw at her closet. Michelle walks by Cole’s bedroom, to see her sister, in front of her vanity, wearing Pajamas and bearing herself from makeup. Cole, always beautiful and kind. Had the house inside her head organized, clean. Perfect Christmas dinner, stunning tree, Cole was everything Michelle wasn’t. Michelle wasn’t nice, she wasn’t pretty in the ways that counted, she wasn’t clean.

 

Michelle was always grieving. Grieving over everything. Grieving over the things she couldn’t even control. Once, in eighth grade, the news broke that Carrie Fisher died. Michelle didn’t even _like_ Star Wars. But when she heard Peter Parker and Ned Leeds talking about Carrie Fisher’s death, Michelle broke down and started sobbing in the middle of home economics. When her teacher, Mrs. Flores, saw Michelle crying; the teacher told her to stay after class. Gave Michelle a sprite and a bar of Hershey almonds. Let Michelle sit in her classroom all through lunch, keeping the large radio near the windows on the classical music station. She didn’t ask any questions, didn’t ask if Michelle was alright. Just graded papers from her desk while Michelle calmed herself down then did her math homework.

 

Mrs. Flores was the youngest teacher in the school, only twenty-four, just outta college, with a wife (everyone made a big deal that she had a wife) and a golden retriever named Darby at home. Whenever Michelle was having a bad day, she would appear in Mrs. Flores classroom during lunch or study hall and hang around. Mrs. Flores was the only adult that Michelle felt comfortable around. Every other adult wanted to _know_ things. Asked too many questions and made silences awkward. Had bad taste in music and was always coming up with an excuse to fix Michelle’s hair or to touch her arm in that “comforting” way. Mrs. Flores didn’t. She understood in all the ways other adults didn’t. Only once ever did Mrs. Flores talk to Michelle about things deeper than Home Ec directly.

 

“When I was only your age,” Mrs. Flores started, sitting in front of Michelle at the table she was doing her health homework at. Mrs. Flores had long red painted nails. She never picked at them, they were flawless. Something Michelle spited her for. Michelle guessed that Mrs. Flores’ house inside her head, her Christmas, was glamorous and astonishing as Mrs. Flores was herself.

 

“Maybe a year older, one summer, I ran away from home. Lived on the couches of friends, spent my saved up birthday and Christmas money on fast food and nights at motels. You see, Michelle,” Mrs. Flores continued, taking a sip of her iced coffee.

 

“I came from a very wealthy family, we lived in this huge beautiful Victorian house in a tiny town in Maine. These beautiful hardwood floors, had this elegant wrap around front porch. I came from old money, and my mothers family had been living in the town for _years._ So she, of course, was the town sweetheart. Everyone loved her, but she was a cherry. Beautiful and red on the outside, but had a hard inner core,” Mrs. Flores put a fist to her heart and tapped. Michelle was slightly confused, wondering why Mrs. Flores was telling her this. Why this was relevant during study hall.

 

“I just ran away, and my mother didn’t even call the police. Didn’t go looking for me. Just let me roam, let me act ten years older than I was. Eventually, it was my pastor who found out I was sleeping in the basement of the church for a few nights that took me home. When I knocked on the door, my pastor waited in the car to make sure I went inside. My mother must’ve seen him, because she bent down and hugged me. Pulled me into her arms like I was a teddy bear, and hid her face in my hair that I chopped off in a public bathroom. She whispered in my ear, and I’ll never forget this- ‘ _I should’ve turned my back on you like you were a bullet._ ’ “ When Mrs. Flores finished, she picked, for once, at her perfect red nails. The nail polish coming off easily, like peeling off a layer of skin.

 

“Michelle, do you know why I’m telling you this?” Mrs. Flores asked, peeling off another layer of skin. Of nail polish. Peeling back paint and revealing a hidden door. Michelle didn’t know why Mrs. Flores was telling her this, why this memory somehow had something to do with Michelle. Michelle shook her head as a response to Mrs. Flores’s question.

 

“Because I was so lost that month or so I ran away. I was lost in this town I lived in the entirety of my life, lost in myself. I knew _nothing._ I was losing a hold on reality and the world was losing its hold on me. But shortly after I went back home, I met the person that would later introduce me to Wilsen. Michelle, you’re young. And you’re lost. You’re gonna be lost for a very long time, really long. Life is- life is a big thing and you won’t ever have a map. I just want you to know that people are going to act like you’re a loaded gun, like you’re a bullet. Only because you aren’t the things they want you to be or because you are lost,” Mrs. Flores looked out the window. Peeled off another nail. Peeled off another layer of skin. Took a deep breath.

 

“But you’ll find yourself one day. Find who you are, find who is important to you and who isn’t worth your time. What you want to be and where you want to be. You’ll find yourself one day. I know you will, you’re strong. You’re going to be okay, I know you will be.” And before Michelle could ask any more questions the bell rung and Mrs. Flores was standing up. Mrs. Flores patted Michelle’s shoulder and went back to her desk. “Get out of her Michelle, go be young.”

 

After that day, Michelle stopped assuming that everyone's Christmas dinners, that everyone’s Christmas trees, that everyone’s house inside of their heads, was perfect. She stopped comparing her ruined Christmas day to others. Because everyone has a layer of skin, a nail, waiting to be peeled off.

 

When Michelle wakes up the next morning, the day after the party, she feels stale. Like old chips or rotten milk. She looks at her phone, it’s five am. So Michelle sneaks to the shower and washes yesterday out of her hair. When she wipes down the foggy mirror with a damp hand, she isn’t surprised to see a girl that doesn’t look like Michelle Jones staring at her. Michelle hates mirrors, they’re never honest. They’re never right. They lie too often.

 

 _Don’t you know,_ Cindy told Michelle once. _Emotions don’t come with a warning. They don’t send invites or hang up signs. If you waited for an invitation to feel every emotion, you’d be waiting forever._

 

On Christmas eve, at her grandmothers house, Michelle dressed up like she always did. Nice black jeans and a flowy red dress shirt. Heels, because her mother told her to wear heels, and little makeup. It was tiring, Michelle loved her family. Only, they didn’t understand why she cried at Bo Burnham’s “Make Happy” or the same episode of Golden Girls. Why Michelle spent all day in bed or why she read so often. Why she threw herself into her school work when Michelle really _hated_ Spanish.

 

It was nice, fun even. People started to get drunk around nine thirty and Michelle sat on the front porch at ten. Listening to her family yell and play “Heads Up” and listening to people drive around a few streets over. It had stopped snowing, Cole was talking to some of their cousins. Michelle wondered what her friends were doing. Ned was out of the country, visiting family to celebrate Christmas. Betty, who was Jewish, had already celebrated her holiday. So she was probably hanging around with family. Cindy was at The Nutcracker ballet, her mother insisted on the Moon family to go every Christmas because Mrs. Moon was a former ballerina. Liz might’ve been visiting her dad, or maybe she was just with her family. All of them avoiding the topic of her own father who was spending Christmas alone in a jail cell.

 

Peter was with May, maybe looking at old photos of their family who watched from heaven. Maybe drinking hot chocolate and eating Chinese food because Michelle knew May couldn’t cook. Maybe they were watching movies, both of them reminiscing on shared memories of Christmas’s with Ben and May telling Peter about her childhood. How Peter’s mother talked a lot and cut May’s hair with safety scissors, about how May’s favorite color was baby blue and Mary’s was orange. And their grandparents, Peter’s great-grandparents, always gave May orange clothes and Mary baby blue. Maybe they were having a Christmas, a true one, and Michelle slightly hated the fact that everyone was happy on Christmas Eve. That everyone was enjoying themselves. _Because how could other people be so wonderfully happy when Michelle couldn’t?_

 

Michelle didn’t know if any of that was true. If Peter was spending Christmas like that. She only imagined, only thought. Only hoped that Peter was spending Christmas with May, because even though Peter pissed her off and talked too much. Ditched people when they needed him, even though Peter was a little bit of a moron, he still deserved to have a good Christmas. So did May. May deserved the world. That was one of the only things she could say about May. May went through so much, and she deserved to have a peaceful Christmas.

 

Michelle remembered her freshman year, how her mother told her that Mr. Parker died. Was in the wrong place that the wrong time and he was shot. Michelle remembered going to the funeral, it was in January. Late January. They played In The Garden by Elvis Presley. How May seemed to be a ghost, holding Peter’s hand. Crying quietly, Peter had said a eulogy, spoke softly. His face red and blotchy, wearing a nice suit. He talked about his uncle fondly, recalled a memory when he was seven. About Ben and him at the playground and how someone pushed Peter off the monkey bars. How Peter broke his arm, and on the way to the hospital Ben sang along to David Bowie and Queen. How he told Peter bad jokes in the waiting room to make Peter laugh.

 

Michelle remembered seeing May watch from the side, wearing a black dress and had a daisy tucked behind her ear. Michelle had never seen something so beautifully tragic.

 

Michelle watched the whole funeral happen, her mother and father with their arms around each other. Cole standing next to Michelle, both of them wearing black clothes. Michelle remembered how her parents held hands on the way home in the front seat. She remembered how her parents looked at each other, how they still look at each other, with _love._ With the love that you see in movies. The love books are written about, the love everyone says is fake.

 

The main thing Michelle remembers is the look May had on her face. The way you could see her heartbreaking with each word spoken. With each “sorry for your lost,” and sympathetic look. Michelle remembers walking up to May, as a fourteen-year-old with unruly hair and chapped lips. How Michelle walked away from her parents, listening to them hiss at her to come back. How Michelle just hugged May, already an inch or so taller than her.

 

Michelle knew that May’s Christmas, her tree and dinner. Her _whole entire life_ was on fire. Was off track, was fucked up. May Parker’s life would never be the same. Losing the love of your life does that, losing your one and only does that.

 

Michelle swore one thing that day, after seeing her parents and Peter and May and everyone milling around eating crackers. _Michelle Jones would never ever let someone get close enough to fuck up her whole life._

 

Michelle was good at keeping people distant, good at keeping them arms length away. Michelle was fine with being lonely if it meant she wouldn’t have to be as hurt as May was at Ben’s funeral.

 

Michelle went to the place where Ben was shot shortly after the funeral, the first Sunday morning of February. The grass was dead, the building empty. The last owners moved out of state. It was a simple store, sold simple things. Michelle had never been there when it was open, the sign was fading. Mostly gone but still there. You could still faintly see the large white letters that spelled out the name. There was graffiti on the back wall in the ally, the ally where Benjamin Parker died. Shot by a man who thought he had the two-thousand pills they were looking for. The murderers ran far, but not far enough because they were caught by police only a mere hour and a half after Ben’s body was found.

 

There was still blood in the ally, the blood of an innocent family man who was shot for just being there. Who was taken off the earth because he was walking down an ally to get to his car faster.

 

Michelle didn’t know Ben well. He called her Micky, gave her rides home when she was too young to go on the public bus. Ben was nice, he had kind eyes. He always let Michelle ride shotgun and let Michelle choose the radio station while Ned and Peter, or sometimes just Peter, sat in the back seat. He liked peppermint gum, he had a nice singing voice unless he was trying to be funny. The home screen on his phone was a photo of May and Peter. His car smelled like apples, and when May would be there to drive Peter and Michelle home, they would hold hands between the seats.

 

The last time Michelle went to the store, in November, the for sale sign was still there. Nearly three years after the death and the large red for sale sign still sat on the dead grass. Leaning back, words so faded it was difficult to read. A window was smashed, the roof leaning inward. Michelle guessed that no one would ever buy it, that the house would always be home to the murder of an innocent man. That no one could get rid of the blood.

 

Her family got a ride home in an uber after the party. The uber smelled like fresh pine, her mother leaning on her fathers’ shoulder. Cole playing on her phone and Michelle staring out the window.

 

It was a blood moon that night. Red seeping through Michelle Jones’ curtain, illuminating her room with blood. Then, there was a crash against her window and Peter Parker was stumbling inside her bedroom. Staining her carpet with red, fresh iron, blood.

 

The words she says to him stumble out of her mouth, Michelle blames the daisy tucked behind May’s ear. Blames Peter’s red face. Blames Ben’s apple smelling car. Michelle blames the way Michelle always surrenders to the sadness. To the despair.

 

“You should be with May, Peter.”

 

He grimaces, a whine crawling up his throat. “I know I should be, but I need your help.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> few notes,
> 
> wilsen is Mrs. Flores' wife. is Betty confirmed to be Jewish? no. did I make her Jewish? yes.  
> I loved writing about Ben and his death and stuff for some reason. idk. I also used the song In The Garden by Elvis because it was a song that was played at a funeral I went to when I was younger. I'm not sure when the next chapter will be out, or how many chapters there will be. I really hope you guys enjoy! I spent a lot of time on this!! xoxo


	3. A MILLION DAY FUNERAL

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy new year !! 2019!!  
> this chapter might be shitty because it was sorta rushed and messy but that's okay. i hope you all enjoy it!!

They shared the same blood, the blood on her floor was like the blood in the alleyway.

 

Michelle had admittedly always had a slight obsession with blood. She was ten the first time she realized it. Michelle was - _is_ \- smart.

 

It was in a middle school. Her aunts' middle school, sitting on the crowded bleachers with her parents. Michelle got up from the bleachers, wanting a breath of _fucking_ fresh air, and went to the bathroom. Someone, a man, hair that curled at his ears and kind eyes. Kind eyes that didn’t look at her kindly. The man touched her shoulder when she was walking to the bathroom. Michelle, young with long hair in tight cornrows, lips parted in shock. He moved his hand from her shoulder to her neck, to her chin. His hands weren’t like her fathers, they weren’t clean and touchable. These hands were, were ungracious. Were clammy and rough, they weren’t like hands Michelle held. They weren’t like the boys at school, they weren’t like her family members. They were _unsettling._

 

His hand moved from her chin to her parted lips. Full like the ones she got from her father, chapped from the frosted winter. He touched his thumb to her lip, pulling her lips into a pout.

 

Michelle bit the man, hard. Teeth digging into his flesh. His yell of pain ran down the hallway.

 

When he gave her a look of danger, of anger, of him, wanting is destroy her, Michelle ran. Spun on her heels and ran down the hallway. Her booted feet ringing down the school. The man trying to grab her braids, missing by half an inch and Michelle running faster. The school lights off, Michelle opened a door that wasn’t unlocked and leaned against the door. Breathing ragged and her heartbeat echoing in her own fucking ears.

 

Her mother found Michelle, opening the door and turning on the lights. Michelle had blood on her lips, her hands were shaking. Her mother took Michelle home, Cole and her father and grandparents stayed at the concert. Michelle went home with the taste of blood in her mouth and anger in her eyes.

 

It was after that day Michelle started to use blood as a comfort. It wasn’t healthy, Michelle knew this. But when Michelle looks at blood and sees the memory where she fought for herself, it becomes something you seek aid in.

 

 _I am a Sunday evening with bloody hands,_ Michelle wrote in the crease of her forearm once. _But_ _I will turn this blood into ink and this anger into something beautiful._

 

“Michelle, I’m sorry. I know it’s Christmas Eve-”

 

“It’s Christmas, Parker,” Michelle seethes at him. The digital clock by her bed with blue letter illuminating the room reads one o’four am. His blood was distracting, everything was loud and on fire, and the winter breeze was coming through the window.

 

“I got,” Peter took a shaky breath, “hurt.”

 

 _Hurt how?_ Michelle wanted to ask. The words trying to break down her teeth, begging to know.

 

_Hurt in the way I hurt? In the way I blame my pulse because it is the reason my body thinks I’m still alive. Hurt in the way all food tastes like ash and everything looks gray. Hurt in the way I feel like my eyes are being stabbed when I wake up each morning. Hurt in the way my skin feels fake, like at any moment I could peel it off and everyone could see how I really look inside._

 

“It was a fight, a girl was yelling so I went to check what was happening. There was,” Peter sighed and shivered. Took his arm away from his own torso and looked at his hand. Blood, pale hand covered in his ripped spider suit, palm and fingers tinted in blood. “A person, I couldn’t see them. But we got into a fight and I webbed him up. The girl called the police and I waited with her but left right before they came. I was on my way home and I got light headed and heavy.”

 

Peter Parker was about to say more, but he fell. Hard and loud, his body crashing onto Michelle’s carpet. Michelle let him sit there for a second, listening to her house. The wind, the house settling, trying to listen for footsteps on the hardwood floor. For a light switch to turn from down to up, for someone to call her name.

 

No one came, Michelle could lie and say she didn’t care. But she did. Someone should come, even though it’s too early to be up on Christmas morning and her family sleep like the dead.

 

“Peter, oh god, fucking Peter. Where’s your phone? I have to call someone, god Peter. Where is your fucking phone?” Michelle rambled, dropping down to her knees to be nearer to Peter fucking Parker. The stupid idiot, the stupid fuck, the stupid kid who has two dead parents and an uncle, who got bit by a spider and had few friends. Who was too nice, far too nice.

 

She found the phone, his lock screen was Ben and May. It stung, seeing a family that would never be total again.

 

The blood was everywhere, in her mouth, on the mans finger, on her bedroom floor, on Peters’ waist, on the walls in her house. The whole entire house inside of Michelle's head was bloody and gruesome and would never be the same again. All because of Peter Parker.

 

His voice was rough and distant when he answered, his name was right under Ben’s in Peter’s contacts. In a split second, Michelle saw that Peter still texted Ben, more than he texted Tony Stark.

 

“Peter? What the hell, it’s nearly two am,” Tony Stark, the billionaire himself spoke. It wasn’t nearly two am, it was one eighteen. “Peter, answer me.”

 

“Yeah, hi. It’s Michelle Jones. Peter, he’s hurt. There was an accident, he came in through my bedroom window. I don’t know what to do,” Michelle uttered. Hating the way her voice cracked at the end. Michelle almost didn’t care about Peter right then, she cared about May. About seeing May Parker, widow, dead family, at a funeral for her nephew only three years after her husband died.

 

Michelle could hear a light turn on over the phone, could hear Tony Stark getting out of the bed he was laying down in. Could hear him whisper something very softly to a person next to him. Maybe Pepper Potts?

 

“God, where are you? You stupid kids are lucky I’m not upstate,” Tony sighed. Michelle looked over at Peter, he was awake, barely but awake. He groaned and Michelle covered his mouth with her hand. His eyes opened and panic spiked across his face. Locked eye contact with Michelle and shut his eyes again. Michelle took her hand away from him, Peter kept his eyes shut but Michelle could tell he was still breathing.

 

She gave Tony Stark her address, before hanging up the phone Michelle spoke, “try to be quiet. My family is asleep.” In return, Tony just sighed and mumbled an okay.

 

It takes them an hour or so to get to Michelle’s house, Michelle moved Peter onto an old blanket and aided his wound as best as a teenager could. Tony told Michelle to keep Peter awake, ask him questions.

 

Questions weren’t difficult for Michelle, but asking Peter them were. Michelle _didn’t_ want to know things about Peter Parker, not really. Because then he would turn from Peter Parker, the boy she had known since first grade, the boy who still smiled even though he had a tragedy of a life. Michelle liked the way Peter was just a boy, someone at arms length.

 

She hates the question that slips off her tongue, hates the way her hand runs through his hair. Sweaty and oily. Like bedhead. Michelle hates the way she can almost taste the blood. “Tell me about Ben.”

 

His eyes snap open, Mrs. Flores’ mother stands in the doorway. _I should’ve turned my back on you like you were a bullet._ May stands at funeral home, daisy tucked safely behind her ear. Nicole sits in front of her vanity removing her makeup, smiling at Michelle through the mirror. Her parents sit in the car, holding hands and reading the news on her fathers' phone. Ben laid in the alleyway, features fading, blood leaking onto the ground, wondering how he got into this. How he died like this. What would happen to his family?

 

“Ben?”

 

Michelle says nothing in return, keeps her body still. Nails stilling on Peters’ scalp, eyes straying away to the clock. It only had been eleven minutes. Peter breathes, shutting his eyes. Leaning back into Michelle's’ touch. “His left eye was slightly greener than his right, he put salt on his watermelon. May was his high school sweetheart. His car smelled like apples and May’s perfume. He did the crossword and never ended up finishing it by himself. Always needed our help. I’m pretty sure that was on purpose.”

 

Peter chuckles, a car races down the street. The clock in the hallway faintly clicks, Michelle wonders if Peter can hear her own heartbeat.

 

“He would’ve hated his funeral. He really would’ve,” Peter whispered into the light. One of his hands still clutched his torso and the other laid limp at his side. “He liked daisies. May once told him to bring home flowers, he brought tons of daisies home. May forgot to water them, so Ben did.”

 

His words were starting to break, to become slower and further away. “May keeps a bouquet of daisies by her bed, always forgets to water them. Now I do.”

 

Peter was falling asleep, passing out. Tony told her to keep him awake, she was gonna keep Peter Parker awake. Not for herself, or Tony, not for anyone but May and Ben Parker to deserved a better hand of cards than what life gave them.

 

“Peter, stay awake. Come on. Stay awake. Tell me about your parents,” Michelle pleads. One of her hands overlaps the one on his torso, more blood on her hands.

 

“Dad didn’t know how to tie a tie. So mom tied it every morning. Mom drew, journals and canvases everywhere. Mom listened to books while she drew,” Peter’s voice started to crumble. It took Michelle a second to realize he was crying. “I would sit on the couch of their office, watching mom draw while she listened to audiobooks. I miss them, even though I hardly knew them.”

 

“They’re your parents, you deserve to miss them,” Michelle says solemnly. She thinks for a second, considers asking another question, she does. Because it’s Christmas, and it’s late, and Peter stumbled into her room bloody, full of secrets. She wants to know.

 

“What would you say to them if you ever saw them again?”

 

Peter looks up at her, eyes tired and hazy. Michelle had met Peter’s parents once. Only once. _Once._ In second grade, about half a year before they died. They were nice, picked Peter up from school and let Michelle and Ned have one of the cookies out of a box they brought. They had matching tattoos on their wrists. Michelle knows they said something to her, but it all got blurry and distant over time.

 

“I don’t know what I would say to my parents. You can’t say much to someone you hardly knew,” Peter sighed. Looked at the moon. “But, I’d ask Ben… I’d say to Ben, that there are daisies everywhere. Always.”

 

“That there is always a spot at the dinner table for you, there is always an empty side of the bed, always the tea you like in the cabinet. There is always a place for you, a universal place for you,” Peter stops talking. Eyes glassed over and tired, breathing ragged.

 

 _You’re so young,_ Michelle thought, looking down at Peter glazed in the red moonlight and cheeks stained with tears and blood. _You look like you’re lost in the store, waiting for someone to find you. Only no one ever will._

 

Tony calls and says he’s outside. And he is, outside is a black car, headlights off, basking in the light of the blood moon. “Parker, Stark’s here. Outside. Let’s go. I’ll walk you out.”

 

Peter sits up slightly, frowning. “You’re not coming with?”

 

She freezes, considering her options. “I really shouldn’t, if I’m not here in the morning…” Michelle trails off. She couldn’t imagine the look on her family's faces.

 

“We’ll get you back before sunrise,” Peter says. “Just come with.”

 

“Why?” Michelle asks quickly.

 

“Because I want you to come with,” Peter responds while standing up. It’s clumsy, he looks like a piece of crumpled paper that was tried to be flattened back out. “I don’t wanna go alone.”

 

“You won’t be alone, Stark is gonna be there,” Michelle sighs out.

 

“Michelle.”

 

“Fine, I’ll go.”

 

The light in the hallway illuminates under her bedroom door, the familiar noise of footsteps fills her ears. It’s Nicole, Michelle can tell that from a mile away. It’s Nicole, because Nicole walks like a dancer. It’s quiet, her parents walk harshly. But Nicole walks like her personality, soft but present. You know she is around.

 

A soft tapping on Michelle’s door, Michelle sleeps with it locked. “Michelle? Are you alright?”

 

Peter’s eyes widen, his phone vibrates from the floor. Her name gets called again by Nicole. Peter looks at the window, it’s closed. The only way out is through the front door, the front door that is through the Jones’ house. Down the steps and through a small hallway. “Cole, I’m fine. Go back to bed. Santa doesn’t come to the houses with kids who are awake.”

 

(Michelle and Cole had stopped believing in Santa Clause long ago, but Michelle needs to get Cole back into her own bedroom.)

 

“Michelle, come on. What’s going on?” Cole whispers through the door. The handle shakes, Michelle squeezes her eyes shut.

 

“Nicole, go back to bed. I’m fine,” Michelle hisses at her younger sister. It hurts, because Michelle knows, _knows,_ how much Cole cares about Michelle. Knows everything she does for her, knows how Cole wants for Michelle to be happy. “Michelle, I’ll go to mom and dad.”

 

Michelle deflates, sighing she opens the door. Cole, fucking Cole, stands in the doorway staring at the boy in Michelle’s room. Wearing boxers and one of Michelle’s oversized sweaters. Holding the spiderman suit and bloody. “Michelle, what the fuck is going on?”

 

“Cole, this is Peter. Peter, this is my younger sister, Cole,” Michelle introduced opening the door wider. Peter waved. “Cole, don’t freak out. Don’t get mom and dad, just, god. Don’t freak out, please.”

 

“What’s going on then?”

 

Peter whispered Michelle’s name faintly, the photo of Michelle and Cindy on a bookshelf stared at Michelle. The hallway light gleamed into the room, the blood moon was on her back. Everyone was waiting for the answer.

 

So Michelle gave them the answer, gave them the reason her house was always on fire, the reason she was empty so frequently, the reason she cut off all her hair. The reason she kept people at arms length and the reason everything seemed so loud so often.

 

“Life is going fast, Cole. And I’m missing it. I’m laying in bed every day staring at the wall, doing absolutely nothing, ever! I know this isn’t how I should handle it, sneak out on Christmas at two am with Spider-man. I know, trust me, I do. But I can’t handle this right now. I can’t lay in bed for one more second even though it’s nighttime and Christmas. I need out, I need out of this fire, I need to get better,” the tears were coming. Michelle wiped them angrily.

 

“I need to do something, anything. I’ll be back before sunrise. Just let me do this, Nicole. Please, let me,” Michelle pleaded. Eyes burning, and hands shaking.

 

“Okay,” Cole said. “Go, be back before we open presents. I love you.”

 

Michelle pulled her younger sister into a hug, shutting her eyes and submerging herself into the memories of Michelle and Nicole Jones. Only a few weeks shy of two years apart, Nicole Jones was fifteen. Michelle was nearly seventeen. Nostalgia hit Michelle like a bullet, in the heart. Knocking her dead in half a second.

 

“I love you too. So much. So much.”

 

Nicole was out of the room then, turning off the hallway light and shutting her door quietly. Michelle put on some sweatpants over her boxers, a large sweater over her t-shirt. Slipping on some winter boots and looking over at Peter. Nodding at Michelle, Peter asked, “you ready?”

 

Michelle looked behind Peter at her window. This wasn’t something to be scared of, of leaving the house, of being a _teenager._ Of going out at night with a boy. Even if it is just because he was stabbed and was a superhero.

 

Michelle was alive, was a breathing, living, organism. Michelle was a person, with a fire inside of her head and hope in her eyes. Michelle was a good who was sneaking out with Peter Parker to go with Tony Stark. And it was _fine._

 

( _Michelle,_ Nicole thought from her bed. _Be careful. You can’t live with me. I can’t live without you. If you die, I will die too.)_

 

One part of Michelle was begging her feet to stay put, to not open the front door and walk onto the walkway to Stark’s car. One part of Michelle was telling her to be safe, go back to bed. To lay down, Peter Parker is not worth this. May Parker and Ben Parker aren’t worth this. _Your life is not worth this,_ the voice spoke. _Come back to bed, come back and lay down. This war can end right now._

 

 **_No,_ ** Michelle told it. **_War requires sacrifices. This is one of them._ **

 

The winter chill cut through Michelle’s sweatpants. Her boots crunched on the snow, Peter kept a warm hand on her back. Michelle wanted to lean into it, she wanted warmth, wanted and wanted. Michelle wanted to be a normal teenager.

 

The door opened from the inside, Tony Stark sat in the back seat. Michelle saw the surprised face he had when he saw the mocha skinned girl. She saw the look at every adult gives her, the once up and down. The click of the tongue, the wonder, the pity. The disgust on their faces because Michelle wears her hair like a wig. It doesn’t belong. Michelle wears her skin like something removable, something that she could peel off.

 

“Who’s she?” Tony asked Peter. Like they hadn’t spoken on the phone.

 

“Michelle Jones, I need to be home by sunrise. Peter needs to be home before then,” Michelle answered for Peter. Her voice had a snap to it.

 

“Go back inside, Jones. You don’t need to be here,” Tony spoke, looking down at his phone.

 

“I want her to come,” Peter tells Tony. His voice is raspy and he looks far younger than he actually is.

 

 _Compared to you,_ Michelle thought distantly, _I look like I’ve lived a hundred years._

 

Tony sighed, looking up at the two teenagers in his car. The car was fancy, seats across from each other. He was reading an article from the looks of it. “Ugh, fine. Whatever, you’ll both be home by sunrise.”

 

Michelle leaned back into the car seat, looked out the window. She knew Nicole was watching. Was watching as the car started and started to drive down the street.

 

No one asked where they were going. How long it would take to get there. Why Tony Stark was in town. No one asked any questions, they listened to slow and easy Christmas music over the speakers in the car.

 

It was too dark to see the building they walked into. Tony walked in front of them, Peter walked with Michelle, keeping a hand on the small of her back once again. Someone named Happy walked behind them, talking quietly on his phone. Everything was slightly blurry, colors meshing together. There was a waiting room when they walked in. It was all very bright, making Michelle wince and look at her shoes. It wasn’t a hospital, but it was something like that. The moment Michelle walked in, time seemed to go slower.

 

“Kid, come with me. Jones, I guess you stay out here. Happy’ll keep you company,” Tony said while putting an arm around Peter and disappearing down a long hallway before Michelle could object.

 

Happy didn’t keep her company, he sat across the room from Michelle in fact. Michelle didn’t bring her phone, or a book, or anything to keep herself entertained. So she walked around the room, running her hands over things. Skimmed through some old highlights magazines sitting in a tiny tray. Found the toothbrush and looked at the pages where kids before he had drawn, some inside the lines and neatly. Others, messy and angry scribbles.

 

About an hour or so, maybe it was longer, Michelle couldn’t fucking tell, Tony walked up to her. She had laid herself on a few waiting room chairs, rested her head on her arms and stared at the ceiling. It almost felt like home.

 

“You can see him, he’s asleep, but you can see him.”

 

His hair was messy, covered in a blanket and laying in a bed. Tony had left her in there alone with Peter. Tony seemed to be talking with the people who helped Peter, but again, Michelle couldn’t tell. Michelle checked the time on Peter’s phone, it was nearly four thirty am. Michelle pushed his hair back, Peter stirred but didn’t wake up. He was dreaming, maybe about a life where he was never bitten.

 

His phone started to ring in her hand, his ringtone was Somebody To Love by Queen. _Aunt May_ the phone read. Michelle panicked, looked at Peter sleeping in the bed. Remembered the daisy, the black clothing, the way Peter missed a week of school every January. Off the radar completely.

 

Michelle Jones picked up the phone, greeted by May Parker asking weakly where Peter was.

 

“Hi, Mrs. Parker, it’s Michelle Jones. Peter got hurt,” Michelle said into the phone calmly.

 

“Peter got hurt?! What the hell, where’s Tony?” May hissed into the phone. Her voice was firm and scary.

 

“One second, Mrs. Parker. I’ll give the phone to him,” Michelle answered, it was difficult to hear May in stress.

 

“Michelle, I’ve known you since you were a little girl. You can call me May.”

 

“Okay, Mrs- I mean, May. Here’s Tony.” Michelle handed the phone to Tony, standing between him and the people he was talking to. Forcing him to pick up the phone and talk to May Parker.

 

“Michelle?” Peter called from the room, he was sitting up now. And crying, and crying and crying.

 

“Oh god, Peter, what’s wrong?”

 

“It hurts, Michelle. It hurts,” Peter whispered to her. Rubbing his face and stiffing a sob.

 

“Should I get the doctor?”

 

“No, not that. I just miss it all.”

 

Michelle cannot always remember losing anyone that close to her (even though she has), but she always remembers losing herself herself. Losing someone, Michelle knows, is like having something ripped from the inside of your chest. From your heart. Peter’s heart must look like a scrapbook, covered in nothing but pain. Bits and pieces of broken memories, blood from the alleyway running through his veins. Whispers from people he barely knew being the air he needs to breathe. His skin must be something he has tried to peel off, wanting a new life. And each time he never got it.

 

The boy of shattered mirrors. Of hope hiding in the sea of thoughts. Of never sleeping because sleep would mean he would see people who he won’t ever see again. Of meds to keep him from falling, of worrying about the only family he has left. Of not knowing who is in the mirror because the only time he knows who he truly is, is when he is in the suit.

 

Michelle guessed Peter Parker’s life was like the part in the old cartoons where the man takes a few too many steps off the cliff and looks at the audience. Where in that split second before he falls, you think it’s not funny. It’s scary. It’s a person falling into something, and never making it out again. But then the cartoon falls, and you laugh. Even though it’s not funny.

 

“Go back to sleep, Peter. I’m guessing your aunt will be here soon,” Michelle spoke, rubbing his arm. Her hands were clammy, his arm was odd to feel. It wasn’t exactly like skin should feel. His skin felt like the cartoon man's skin, not real.

 

Peter shut his eyes and dreamed about the life he would’ve had if his uncle hadn’t wanted to get to his apple smelling car faster. How his life would’ve been if he noticed the spider on his hand sooner. How his life would’ve been if he wasn’t a timeline of the world ending.

 

“ **_Peter_ ** _?” Ben called from the blackness. “_ **_I’ve missed you so much_ ** _.”_

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading! xx


	4. RABID BITS OF TIME

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is angst, sorry. i'm posting it right away because i wrote it and i'm proud of it and i can't wait to share it.  
> this chapter is about peter having a moment in time with ben, i got the idea shortly after i finished the first chapter so here we are. it's also shorter than the others, but still!! i hope you all enjoy!!

“ **_Peter_ ** _?” Ben called from the blackness. “ _ **_I’ve missed you so much_ ** _.” _

 

Everything was dark, with a faint glow around Ben. He was wearing the outfit he wore the day he got shot. Soft blue jeans and a gray sweater May got him for his birthday. He looked the same, same kind eyes and short fingernails. 

 

“Uncle Ben!” Peter yells, running up to the older man, through the water, through the memories, running to his uncle who he hadn’t seen in nearly three years. His uncle smelled like the cologne he bought at the mall and apples. 

 

“Hey, Kiddo,” Ben said while rubbing Peters’ back the way he always did. “What are you doing here?” 

 

Where was he? As soon as Ben asked that the blackness started to fade and it started to slowly become the sidewalk where Ben would park his car. “I don’t know,” Peter answered.

 

**_“Is he okay?”_ **

 

**_“Yeah, he’s fine. Just asleep.”_ **

 

“Let's go on a drive, kiddo,” Ben said, walking to the other side of the car and getting in. When Peter opened the car door he was greeted with the scent of fall, with the way Ben kept the radio on the classic rock station. “How do you feel?” 

 

“Tired, gray. If that makes any sense,” Peter returned. The clouds were gray, so were the buildings, so was everything else. Besides Ben. Ben was light and he seemed real.

 

“Of course it makes sense! What’s the last thing you remember?” Ben inquired, turning the blinker on and checking the mirrors. 

 

_ “Go back to sleep, Peter. I’m guessing your aunt will be here soon.”  _ Michelle told Peter while rubbing his arm. The way it was bright then it wasn’t. The way Ben’s voice was the first thing he heard. One moment it was Michelle and the real life, the next Ben was there. 

 

“I’m, I’m not sure.”

 

The street appeared as they drove, if Peter looked too hard, he would see the grayness of the New York roads. Peter yawned, leaning back further into his seat. “Peter?” Ben’s voice called, but it seemed so far away now. Growing further and further away.

 

**_“Peter?” The white light talked. His eyes_ ** **_almost_ ** **_opened. But then Ben was calling his name from deep inside his memory and Peter fell backward into his dream._ **

 

“Peter? Are you still with me?” Ben asked, looking away from the road and towards Peter. The road disintegrated from Peter’s eyes. “I’m here, I’m here,” Peter said. Looking at Ben then at the road, and just like that, the road was there again.

 

“How are you doing, Kiddo?” Ben asked the way he always did. Fond, looking at Peter and the road. Tapping along to the muffled music on the steering wheel, Someone To Love was playing. The song that Ben sang to May quite often. 

 

“I miss you. Me and May do, a lot. I wish you didn’t leave as soon as you did,” Peter said. The music was starting to sound like the memory Peter had of Ben, slightly tipsy, singing to May on New Year's Eve. When Ben changed the radio station, it was the memory Peter had of his parents. 

 

He was only six or seven at the time, woke up from a nightmare one Sunday night. He waltzed out into the kitchen to get to his parents' bedroom but stopped in the hallway. Hiding behind the doorframe. His parents, young and beautiful, dancing in the kitchen. His mother’s curly brown hair hanging down her back. Arms wrapped around his fathers’ neck. Her pajamas were just a large t-shirt and shorts. His father was wearing a white t-shirt with flannel boxers. They looked in love, dancing slowly with one another, content in the presence of the other. A soft song playing from his mothers’ phone.  _ Mary and Richard,  _ those were his parents' names. The song that was playing was Flowers In December by Mazzy Star. Peter knew that, because when he was fourteen, nearly seven years after his parents died in the car accident, he googled the little lyrics he still remembered. That song was playing on the radio, faintly as Ben drove on the nonexistent road. 

 

“I miss you both too, Peter. I really do, but this is what life has given us. And we must respect that,” Ben said to Peter. The song stopped by itself, Ben changed lanes and Peter took a drink of water that he didn’t think was in the cup holder before.

 

“It’s not fair, you should be alive. And with May and I, you should be here!” Peter yelled weakly. He dropped the water bottle but it didn’t hit the floor of the car or Peter, it disappeared in thin air as Peter looked over at Ben. Running his hands through his hair over and over, curling his toes into his shoes. Peter then realized that he was wearing the outfit he was wearing the day Ben died. It was bigger and fit, but it was the same t-shirt and joggers. 

 

“Peter, kiddo, I wish I was too. I hated seeing May like that, I still do. I hated seeing you like that, I still do. But this is where we are now, this is  _ who  _ we are now. I’m not there anymore,” Ben paused, pulling the car over on the nonexistent road and stepping out of the car. Opening Peter’s door and waiting as Peter stepped out of the car and onto a field that seemed to appear from nowhere. The field had nice green grass and a tall tree that would give them shade. 

 

“Come on, Peter, I’ll give you a piggyback ride.”

 

It didn’t matter that Peter was nearly seventeen and weighed more than Ben now. None of it mattered, Ben picked up Peter without a word and walked towards the tree humming a song under his breath.

 

**_“Peter, oh my god, Peter. My boy, god.”_ **

 

**_“May, please understand-”_ **

 

**_“Tony, I don’t give a damn. He’s all I have now.”_ **

 

When they got to the tree, Ben set Peter down and handed him a water bottle. It wasn’t there before, nothing was there before. Nothing was there ever when Ben wasn’t around. 

 

“I’m still your uncle Ben, Peter. I always will be,” Ben said looking at the sun through the white puffy clouds.

 

“Listen kiddo,” Ben spoke looking over at Peter. “We can’t waste all our time wishing. We just can’t. Sometimes I hope that our wishes will come true, but this one, the one where I come back, won’t come true. It hurts, I know that, Peter. Seeing May in pain like that, after I was shot,” it was strange that Ben knew he was shot. Like he could just talk about it normally, nonetheless, Peter listened to his uncle. 

 

“You’re gonna be okay, Peter. I know you will be. But Peter, don’t let me not being on earth ruin your time there. Enjoy the time with May, enjoy the time with Ned, enjoy it all, Peter. Because you won’t have the chance to say goodbye,” Ben told Peter, leaning against the tree and frowning slightly. He wasn’t sad, Peter knew when Ben was sad or upset, he was probably just mourning. Missing the life he used to have.

 

“How did it feel?” Peter asked, leaning back in the grass looking up at the leaves in the tree. 

 

“How did what feel?”

 

“To die, how did it feel?”

 

Ben sighed, running a hand over his face. He looked tired, stretched thin. He looked like he was fading into nothing but dust. “It was, it was scary. Fast, one moment I was on my way home to see you guys, the next I was on the ground etching every inch of your faces into my head. For my last memory.”

 

Peter nodded, wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. His head started to hurt, his eyes felt misplaced on his face. “Peter?” Ben asked.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“We’re running out of time. I need to tell you a few more things before you wake up,” Ben said urgently. Moving from his spot leaning on the tree to sitting next to Peter.

 

“What do you mean we’re running out of time?” 

 

Ben looked up at the sky, the blueness and white clouds were fading. It was all getting swallowed whole by a bright white light.

 

“It’s hard to explain, kiddo. But listen to me, and listen closely,” Ben directed, putting a hand on Peter’s shoulder. 

 

“I love you and May so much. More than anything in the universe, and I am always there for you. Even though you can’t always hear me or see me, I’m there for you,” Ben was talking sorta fast, words being printed into Peter’s head. Ben’s hand was a welcome weight on his shoulder.

 

“Don’t let me being gone stop you, you’re going to do, amazing, beautiful things. You are gonna marry someday and have children. You’re going to live a full life, you’re going to be  _ okay.  _

 

**_“May?”_ **

 

**_“Oh, Michelle, you scared me.”_ **

 

**_“Will he be okay?”_ **

 

**_“Of course he will be, he’s the strongest person I know.”_ **

 

The light was getting brighter. The clouds were all gone now, so was the sky, the trees, the grass. All that was left was Peter Parker and Ben Parker. Uncle and nephew. A family that would never be whole.

 

“Uncle Ben?”

 

“I’m still here, Peter. Listen, you are one of the kindest people out there. You still have that  _ spark  _ that everyone loses sooner or later. Don’t lose it, Peter. Keep it, value it, hold it close to your heart.” Peter’s clothes were fading, it was turning from the t-shirt and joggers to a hospital gown. His headache grew stronger.

 

“I’m always here for you, Peter. Always,” Ben whispered softly. His hand moved from Peter’s shoulder to his neck. Pulling their foreheads together.

 

“I love you, Peter. I love you and May so much. I love you, and we’ll see each other again,” Ben said as he started to fade. Grow into nothing but a distant memory, nothing but a hazy dream, nothing but broken down lies and deja vu.

 

Ben was going to be a moment stuck in time. This was going to be a moment stuck in time.

 

“I love you, Uncle Ben, I love you,” Peter yelled over the sound of overlapping voices, beeping and Ben holding their foreheads against one another. 

 

“I love you, Kiddo. I love you so much and I’m here for you. Don’t ever forget that, Peter.”

 

Then Ben was gone. Peter’s eyes were open and May was holding his hand while Michelle sat across the room. Tony stood with a man, a doctor, talking in hushed voices.

 

Peter looked at May, her eyes were tired and worried. “He loves you so much, May, so much,” Peter cried, reaching out for his aunt. 

 

“Peter?” May asked, standing up and moving towards Peter to give him a hug.

 

“He loves us so much, Ben does. And he misses us,” Peter sobbed into his aunt's neck. Not caring that Michelle Jones or Tony Stark was in the room, all he cared about right then and there was that May knew how much Ben loved her. 

 

“Oh, Peter. I know he does, I know he does,” May said, stroking his hair. She shot Tony a look from over Peter’s head, and Tony did genuinely look scared. 

 

Michelle watched from the background, from the uncomfortable chair across the room. The sun was going to start to rise soon, she needed to be home. 

 

Tony gave Michelle a look and left the room, calling for Happy. Telling him they had to bring the girl home. Peter looked up at her, eyes glossy and exhausted. 

 

“You got to go home, MJ,” Peter said quietly. May was sitting next to him now. An arm around his shoulders, rubbing his back slightly. 

 

“Are you sure? I can stay-” Michelle tries to say but Peter cuts her off. “Go home, MJ. And be safe, the roads are icy.”

 

Michelle smiles sadly, May stands up and tells Peter she’s going to get him some water. On her way out the door, she touches Michelle’s arm and squeezes. As if she’s saying that she was grateful Michelle was there.

 

“I’ll see you soon, Parker.”

 

Before she gets out the door, jacket halfway zipped and boots slowly becoming untied Peter calls her name.

 

“MJ?”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“I don’t think I would’ve seen Ben again without you, so thank you. For saving me,” Peter softly murmured to Michelle. 

 

Michelle didn’t know what to say to that, so she smiled, waved and walked out the door.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading!! xoxo


	5. AS WE GROW WE CHANGE AND ADJUST

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> slight trigger warning near the ending of this one! hope you enjoy!

Tony sits in the back seat with her, she stares out the window most of the time. Tony breaks the solid silence after looking at her side profile for three and a half minutes.

 

“So,” he starts, “did you know Ben?”

 

Michelle wasn’t expecting that. The sun was rising and they were near Cindy’s old house. “I sort of did, I suppose. He was nice, he and May were really in love,” Michelle tells Tony. She fiddles with the edge of her jacket, looking at her boots, wondering what Peter was thinking about right now.

 

“How long have you known Peter?”

 

Michelle shrugged, looked at the sun slowly rising. “Since first grade, maybe. We’ve known each other for a while now, but we were never close,” Michelle said. She was tired and sitting in the backseat of a car that might’ve cost more than her life with a billionaire genius.

 

“Did you have a good childhood?”

 

It was such a simple yet complex question, _yes, I had a good childhood. No, I do not know why I can’t get out of bed without crying. No, I do not know why everything hurts. No, I do not know why everything is always on fire._

 

“Yeah, I really did. But,” she breathes in and out slowly. “I don’t know, life came up really fast. I don’t know,” Michelle doesn’t realize that tears are pricking her eyes. When she looks up, Michelle expects to see capital P, Pity in his face, but she doesn’t. She just sees understanding, some almost nice and comforting.

 

“Even under the best of circumstances, there's just something so damn tragic about growing up,” Tony says, leaning back in the seat and looking out the window briefly. “I once loved a girl, when I was young and stupid,” Tony says without warning. It’s a story and Michelle is willing to listen. It’s nice to hear it instead of reading it.

 

“We thought well of each other, and I think we thought we’d be happy with together. But life came up fast, you know? Now, I’m alone, I have a good life, but I’m not happy,” Tony sighed and chuckled bitterly. “I think that if I would’ve let myself rest and look around for a moment, I would be happier. But I didn’t so I’m not.”

 

Michelle took this in for a second, “who was she? The girl, I mean?”

 

Tony smiled faintly, caught in memory. “Her name was Beatrice, she’s happy now. Has two kids and a good job. Is divorced, but happy. She sent me a letter once, a long time ago. Telling me to ask her for coffee, I never did.”

 

“What was she like?” Michelle asks because she wants to know everything. That might be why she reads so many books. Because Michelle likes knowing that Tony Stark was in love with someone the media hadn’t covered, someone who Tony obviously thinks about but doesn’t talk about. Michelle likes knowing his Christmas story, it’s nice, to realize you’re not alone. Even though she’s told it all the time.

 

“She was nice in all the ways most people weren’t, you looked at her and you just saw _light_ ,” Tony says to Michelle. “Somedays I wonder why I was such an idiot.”

 

“What happened?” Michelle asked. Tony looked up at Michelle, streetlights shone on his face. Michelle touched the car window, they were near her house. “With you and her. What happened?”

 

Tony ran a hand over his face, sighing, “I cheated,” he mumbled. “And she was too good for that.”

 

“What about Pepper Potts?”

 

“I love her, I really do. But some people aren’t made to be loved,” Tony says the quietly. They are pulling up on her street. The car slows to a stop in front of the Jones household. No lights are on, so she’s still safe to sneak back in.

 

Michelle puts one hand on the door handle and looks back at Tony Stark. She starts talking.

 

“Everyone is made to be loved, maybe you guys just aren’t in love the way you need to be. Pepper loves you, and you love Pepper. But maybe, maybe it’s not right. Maybe you’ve adjusted to a life that you started out unhappy in so you thought it couldn’t get worse. And it didn’t, but everything just started to feel the same.”

 

Michelle opens the door, looks back at him one more time, Tony looked tired. “Just because you _want_ it to work doesn’t mean it _should._ ”

 

Michelle taps on the drivers' window and nods, a thank you to Happy. She waves to Tony before shaking the door handle, making sure it’s unlocked.

 

It is.

 

When she opens it her mother is standing in front of Michelle. Her mother, Maria, was beautiful in an unconventional way. In a smart way, technological. Her mother had one of the most soothing voices Michelle has ever heard, and her Father said that he knew he was going to marry her the moment he heard her voice ask what he wanted for a drink at a bar in college. She was a bartender, Michelle knew how to make drinks because of her.

 

“Mom,” Michelle starts, looking around the house. It’s pitch black and the only glow in the hallway is the Christmas tree slightly gleaming from the living room. They keep it off at night, but the star doesn’t turn off. It’s on all the time, so the white light lands on her mothers’ face.

 

“Michelle,” she holds up a hand. “Just tell me where you were.”

 

Her mother doesn’t seem mad, she just seems tired. Maria Jones loved her family deeply, she now had a part-time job with one of her friends who used to live next to them. Michelle acted like her mother, she knew that. Michelle asked her grandmother, her mothers’ mother, what she was like when she was younger.

 

Michelle’s grandmother was mixing batter for cookies, Halloween ones. Michelle was eating the canned frosting that was going to be used to decorate the cookies. “Your mother, your mother was tired a lot when she was around your age. She would go to school, stay up late reading and wake up early to make breakfast. But on the weekends she would go to bed early and sleep in late. Like she was trying to sleep away the past week. Then she’d do it all over again the next week, it started when she hit junior high. Lasted until college, I think. She started to be more healthy and such after she met your dad,” her grandmother had said.

 

“You remind me a lot of her, your mother I mean. You both have something in the eyes.”

 

“Michelle, where were you?” her mother asks, and Michelle is hit by a wave of guilt. She left her house because of a boy, and on Christmas. “Mom, I can explain.”

 

“I don’t want you to make this whole big explanation for no reason, Just tell me where you were.” Her mother looks tired, _Like she was trying to sleep away the past week._ Maria Jones has known pain like an old friend, Michelle knew this. Her parents were deeply in love, and Michelle was grateful for that. What she wasn’t grateful for was whenever her father went out of town for work and her mother walked around the house like a ghost. Longing for her husband and not being able to see him. Not for sometimes weeks on end.

 

“I was with Peter Parker,” Michelle begins. “He got hurt, went in through my bedroom window. I called Tony Stark, then Tony picked us up and took us to this hospital type place. I’m not sure, it’s all blurry. This dude named Happy gave me a ride home, Tony and I talked about Ben and Peter. Nothing bad happened, even ask Nicole, she can vouch and say she saw me get into the car with Tony,” Michelle takes a beat. Looks at her mother, and she feels little again. When she was little and her mother would tuck her in and rub her back while Michelle did her homework. When her mother sang her back to sleep when she woke up from a nightmare.

 

Her mother sighs, looks at Michelle and then incrosses her arms. “Is that the truth?”

 

Michelle nods wordlessly.

 

Her mother leans forwards and tucks a piece of hair behind Michelle’s ear, she looks at Michelle honestly and cups her daughter's cheek, “I wish you’d tell me more, Michelle. I understand more than you think.”

 

Her mother puts Michelle to bed after that, tucks her back into bed like she used to when Michelle was younger. Maria Jones closes the curtains and turns off the lamp in the corner of her room, she takes Michelle’s phone and computer from her bedstand and puts it on the desk across the bedroom from Michelle’s bed. “Go back to sleep, I’ll wake you up later,” her mother says, before shutting the door and padding down the hallway. Michelle falls asleep easily. She dreams about white flags turning red with innocence burning over an open flame.

 

Michelle wakes up at eleven, her family waits in the living room watching ‘ _Home Alone’_ and eating popcorn. They open presents, her father takes photos and kisses her mother a lot. Nicole gets a photo of her father kissing their mother on the cheek, and gets a photo of Michelle putting her hair back into a ponytail. Michelle doesn’t check her phone the whole day, and no one brings up the night before. Because it’s Christmas and her family is happy.

 

A photo of her parents' wedding is framed and sits on the bookshelf. Her mother looks happy, but in a distant way.

 

_Something in the eyes..._

 

Michelle goes to sleep when it’s nearly midnight, before her mother goes to bed she goes into each of her daughter's rooms and wishes them one last Merry Christmas and kisses their foreheads.

 

The few days between Christmas and New Years go by in a slow lull. Cole and Michelle play Mario Kart on the new Nintendo Switch they got for Christmas. When Michelle gets sick of losing at Rainbow Road, she quits and watches Cole play Hollow Knight. Their parents, who are already back at work, text them every hour or so asking if everything is okay.

 

Michelle doesn’t get any texts from Peter.

 

She pretends not to care.

 

(She does)

 

Her mother kisses her forehead before bed each night, coos a “Goodnight, darling,” and makes her way out of Michelle’s room. Her mother turns off the light each night and blows out the pine scented candle Michelle keeps lit on her desk.

 

“Mom,” Michelle rasps one night while her mother is blowing out the candle and about to turn off the lamp on her dresser, “were you ever like me?”

 

Her mother sighs and walks away from the lamp, sits on the foot of her bed. She pats Michelle’s foot and smiles sadly. “I was, I remember there was this one time, this one time,” her mother started. “I couldn’t get out of bed for nearly a week. My mother brought me food to eat, tried to get me out of bed. Your uncle Simon spent hours every day reading me books, _A Wrinkle in Time, The Westing games_ …” her mother trailed off.

 

“I remember waking up one night, at four am, and just getting out of bed. I took a shower, I ate a real meal, I cleaned up my room, I lived again. I do not think that was the worst week of my life, but I do think it was the one that gave me the most hope in my sadness,” her mother finished talking while looking down at the floor.

 

“You see Michelle, it’s easy to be sad. It really is, and it’s easy to be happy. What’s difficult is staying sad and happy, and we put so much effort into staying sad that we completely ignore the fact that we could put our energy into being happy,” her mother said, then patted Michelle’s knee through the heavy quilt Michelle slept under.

 

“Mom-” Michelle tried to start but her mother was already shutting the door.

 

“Goodnight, Michelle,” her mother spoke and shut the door.

 

Michelle sees Peter the day after that, he’s walking past her aunts' townhouse, where Michelle and Cole are spending the night. Her aunt, only twenty-four and beautiful, was a personal assistant for someone who owned a big company. Her aunt, Frankie, her fathers' sister, never liked talking about her job.  

 

“It’s a good job,” her aunt said when Cole asked about it on the way to Frankie’s house from theirs, “it’s easy going.”

 

Cole stopped asking Frankie after she noticed Frankie’s knuckles turning white on the steering wheel.

 

Michelle is sitting on the front steps of the townhouse, waiting for Frankie and Cole. Michelle is sitting reading some book while her family gets ready. Michelle focuses on the boring book, then she hears an all too familiar voice.

 

“Mj?”

 

Her head shoots up in a flash, in front of her stands Peter and May Parker. May looks better than she did the last time Michelle saw her, but May looked tired. “Peter?”

 

He smiles and something cracks inside of Michelle, music is playing quietly in the townhouse. Michelle can faintly hear Frankie yell something to Cole.

 

“Hey, how’ve you been?”

 

“Fine,” Michelle said blankly. May smiled at her, and it felt like someone stabbed Michelle in the gut. May was one of the nicest people on earth, and she got a bad batch of cards.

 

“Michelle,” Frankie said, stepping out of the townhouse, putting in an earring while she spoke. “Have you seen Cole’s phone? She’s freaking out- who are they?”

 

Frankie stared at the Parker’s like they were from a different planet, her earrings were large glistening gold hoops. She was wearing a button-up jean skirt and fishnet stockings. Her coat was long and light brown. The color of milked coffee. “Frankie, this is Peter and May Parker, Peter and May this is my aunt, Frankie.”

 

“It’s nice to meet you both,” Frankie said smiling, it was the same smile she gave Michelle’s step-grandmother, her stepmother. Not fake, but not genuine either. She looked away from May and Peter and looked down at Michelle, “Michelle, the car will be picking us up soon,” Frankie said in a hushed voice.

 

Michelle stands up and Frankie smiles and waves before heading back inside of the townhouse. “It was nice to see you, Michelle,” May states before turning to Peter and whispering something, then she walks away.

 

“Where’s May going?” Michelle asks, watching the older women walk down the sidewalk. “She’s going to a store, I’ll be meeting her there soon.”

 

“Thank you… for the other night. I don’t know what I would’ve done if you weren’t there.” Peter runs a hand through his hair and Michelle notices that one of his hands has gauze wrapping on them. “What’d you do to your hand?”

 

Peter looks down at his hand, white gauze tinted with a faint red blood stain, _blood_ , he rolls his head from looking down at his hand up at Michelle. “I fell down some concrete steps outside of Ned’s house.”

 

Michelle just nods.

 

“Well, I’m gonna go, I’ll see you later. Bye, Michelle,” Peter bids his farewell. His eyes are glinting in the afternoon light and he kicks a piece of ice with the tip of his shoe. Red Vans, with fat black laces. Double knotted because,  _of course,_ Peter double knots his shoes.

 

Peter smiles at Michelle, and something inside her _shifts_. Moves from one place to another, something cracks. Breaks open and reveals a light, shining onto the ground, through the window and onto the floor where shattered Christmas ornaments lay and where ashes from old trees live.

 

It shouldn’t be like this. Michelle Jones does not _like_ other people, god such a high school saying. She shouldn’t have light in her always dark home, she learned how to live in the darkness. How to function without a flame, how to move and breathe and be _somewhat_ okay in the dark. Michelle Jones has learned how to be alive in her fucking Christmas story and Peter Parker was messing it all up.

 

“Michelle, the car’s here. Let’s go,” Frankie says while walking out of the townhouse with Nicole and locking the door. As they walk towards the car, Michelle turns around and sees Peter walking toward the store. He doesn’t turn around and they don’t make eye contact. Michelle sees that his hair curls at his neck, it’s surprisingly endearing.

 

Michelle Jones shouldn’t notice that. Shouldn’t care when he doesn’t text. Shouldn’t feel like this.

 

And yet.

 

Listen. Michelle can explain _why_ she looked at Peter _that_ way when she was crowned or whatever captain of the decathlon.

 

Michelle was sad. And lonely. And enjoyed the fact that people were around her, caring. Then Peter checked his phone and Michelle's mouth spoke before her mind could catch up.

 

There is something nice about people caring about you, about what you’ve accomplished even when you don’t care that much.

 

One night, after her mother had tucked Michelle in and before the end of Christmas break, Michelle’s phone rings. Unknown number. She changed her ringtone to Space Song by Beach House. The guitar always sounded like it was crying, Michelle always liked the sound of it.

 

Michelle stares at it for five rings until she caves and answers it, “hello?”

 

“Is this Michelle Jones?” a firm voice says, Michelle hesitates before answering. “Yes, this is she.”

 

“Please hold,” the voice says, then on hold music plays. It’s annoying, it reminds her of the doctors' office.

 

“Michelle?” another voice says, this time the voice is familiar. She’s heard it before but she can’t remember _where._

 

“Yes?”

 

“This is Faye Moon, Cindy’s mother? I’m sorry to call you so late, it’s just that, that Cindy is hurt and we’re at the hospital but she keeps saying that she wants you here.”

 

“Oh, well I’ll be there soon. Where are you again?” Michelle says into the phone, getting out of bed and putting some joggers on. Mrs. Moon tells her where all the while Michelle is panicking on the other side of the phone, wondering what Cindy did.

 

Michelle throws open her bedroom door and waddles down the hallway to her parents' room. She knocks loudly. Her father answers the door, Raymond Jones, six foot three, wearing a white t-shirt and flannel Pajama bottoms. “Michelle, are you alright?” he asks, and Michelle notices her mother stirring and turning on the lamp on her side of the king-sized bed.

 

“Cindy is hurt, she’s in the hospital, I’ve got to go,” Michelle stutters out. Her father sighs before moving back to the bed and grabbing his wallet and keys on his nightstand. Michelle’s mother, Maria, murmurs something to him. He says something back, before kissing her and turning off the lamp. He walks back to Michelle who stands in the doorway quickly.

 

“Let’s go, get your shoes and coat on. I’ll start the car, mom and Nicole will stay home,” her dad says while walking down the steps and to the front door. Slipping on his shoes and opening the front door. “Put on a hat too, it’s cold outside.”

 

Michelle nods, stumbling down the steps and putting on her coat. It doesn’t match her joggers or _Wreck it Ralph_ t-shirt. It doesn’t matter now. She puts on some boots, some Bearpaw boots Michelle got for Christmas from her grandmother. Everything seems loud and fast.

 

The ride to the hospital was drawn out and dark. New York was busy, as it always is, and her father let Michelle play her own music out loud, as he always did. It is the thirtieth of December, tomorrow will be New Year's Eve, Michelle will stay up and watch the ball drop on TV. Frankie will spend the night at the Jones household, sleeping on the couch because she hates the guestroom. Cole, Michelle, and Frankie will sit on the floor of the living room, eating chips and watching every New Years episode of Fraiser. Cole will fall asleep on the floor because she always does, and Michelle and Frankie will cover her in the blanket that lays over the couch.

 

Everything was on fire. Again. And again. And again. Michelle was sad. Again. And again and again.

 

“Michelle,” her father began, still looking out at the road. “Do you know what happened to Cindy?”

 

She didn’t. Cindy had been forming into something that wasn’t a teenager. She said that it felt like there was something rattling in her body. That there was a Bang, Pop, Wow!

 

Michelle just shook her head when her father looked at her expectedly.

 

The night goes by in one long mute movie to Michelle, like she’s standing from above watching her life fold out before her. She can’t visit Cindy yet so she sleeps in the waiting room, on a bunch of chairs like she did when she was waiting for Peter.

 

_Peter…_

 

Michelle and her father sit in the chairs of the waiting room. Mrs. Moon, Faye, sits across from them. Mr. Moon, Tyler, is out of town. Michelle knew very little about Tyler Moon, he worked with his brother, he was always out of town. He and Faye married only two weeks after Faye came of age, he and Mrs. Moon had Cindy’s older sister, their only other child, when they were only seventeen.

 

Michelle knew more about Faye Moon. She was only seventeen when she had Marian, twenty when she had Cindy. She was a ballerina, a good one too. She quit when Cindy was born. And she was beautiful in all the ways someone should be. When you saw Faye Moon, you’d wonder how you’ve lived your life _without_ seeing her.

 

Once, Michelle and Cindy were looking at old photos at the Moon household. They came across photos of Faye, wearing a leotard and ballet shoes. She wasn’t aware someone was taking photos of her in most of them, dancing or stretching. Looking at the ballet teacher, laughing with her friends, there were tons of them.

 

“Why,” Michelle started picking up a photo of a young Faye, “is there so many photos of her doing ballet?”

 

Cindy shrugged, set down the batch of photos she was holding, “Mom! Come here!” Cindy yelled, leaning back and falling onto her back to look down the hallway from the living room where they were sitting. When Cindy didn’t hear footsteps she yelled again, "Mother! Come here!”

 

Cindy flipped through a few more of the photos, listening to the footsteps making their way into the living room.

 

“Yes?” Faye Moon walked into the living room, and Michelle was hit with the wave of beauty and calm Mrs. Moon brought with her wherever she went.

 

“Why are there so many photos of you in ballet?” Cindy asked, handing her mother a stack of photos. Faye smiled, that day. The memory went blank from there.

 

“Michelle?” her father snapped Michelle out of the memory, Faye was standing looking down at Michelle. Even when she was tired and worried and scared, she was beautiful.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“You can go see her now, Faye said she’d give you a ride home. I love you,” her father said while standing up, Michelle nodded. And leaned into the hug her father gave her.

 

“I love you too.”

 

Cindy was laying in the hospital bed, looking out the window. Michelle knew she probably put up a fight to make the nurses open the blinds. Michelle sat in the chair near the doorway, watching as Faye sat and squeezed her daughter's hand. Cindy was awake, but in that state where everything seems slow and blurry.

 

“Michelle?”

 

An hour later, Faye is outside of the room, standing in the hallway talking to the doctors as Michelle and Cindy sit in the hospital room. Michelle does not ask what happened, why Cindy is there, if she is alright. Instead, Michelle pulls up a chair by Cindy’s bed and reads her _Because of Winn-Dixie_ that Faye brought with them for when Cindy woke up because that was Cindy’s favorite children's book.

 

“Michelle,” Cindy croaked after the first few chapters. “Do you ever miss… Do you ever miss your most painful memories? Like, do you ever wish that you could go back and relive them _because_ they were so painful?”

 

Michelle leaned back in the chair, and looked at the girl in front of her. Cindy Emory Moon, sixteen, to turn seventeen in July. She was hiding something, she always was.

 

“Yeah, maybe,” Michelle spoke, paused and looked back at Cindy. “But I think that if I kept reliving the pain, everything would feel the same. If that makes sense.”

 

Cindy nods, and Michelle goes by to reading.

 

Another hour later, Cindy is asleep in the chair and it is nearing five am. Michelle declines Faye’s fourth offer to drive Michelle back home. Michelle’s mother and father text her every once and awhile. Michelle reads a new article about Spider-Man, when she finishes that she reads fan theories about How I Met Your Mother.

 

It hits her quickly.

 

Cindy Moon probably tried to kill herself tonight.

 

Michelle doesn’t think about that longer than she needs to.

 

When it’s six am and Michelle is sitting on the chair with her feet on the bed and she continues to read to Cindy, who woke up after a fitful forty-five minutes of sleep. Faye sits on the other side of the bed, listening to Michelle read, holding her daughter’s hand.

 

“Hey mom,” Cindy starts while Michelle is taking a sip of water a nurse brought for them. Faye looks at her daughter, pushing some hair out of Cindy’s face. “Are you used to the warm summers in New York yet?”

 

Faye laughs, smiling but it’s empty. Worry filled. “I’m not sure, darling. But I’ll get there.”

 

Cindy hums and her head lolls around. Michelle’s phone buzzes. She expects it to be her family, but it’s Peter. The text just says, “ _why are you at the hospital?”_

 

Michelle sighs, looking at Cindy and Faye who are talking. She texts back, “ _Cindy got hurt. And how the hell do you know I’m here?”_

 

Peter texts back, _“I saw through the window, I'm spider-man, you know. I have my ways.”_

 

Michelle says nothing back. She tucks her phone back into her pocket

 

“Last time I was back home,” Faye starts, Michelle doesn’t ask where home is. She just listens, looking at Faye and Cindy. “I wondered how I could’ve ever lived there. It’s so cold! At least in New York, we have seasons, back home it was cold all the time,” Faye laughs. And Cindy smiles at her mother, then at Michelle.

 

"Yeah," Cindy starts.

 

_Blood. Growing up. Should've turned my back on you like you were a bullet. Young. The alleyway and pills. The daisy behind May's ear. Tony thinking about his last love. Frankie's knuckles turning white. The son looking at her like she was food. No warning. The tree is on fire. The villages are broken. The dinner is ruined. The light is shining. Everything is changing._

 

“It’s funny how we adjust.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is sorta a filler one, and I'm so sorry I haven't updated in the last week! I'm sorry if this one isn't that good, but better things are to come.  
> thank you for reading !


	6. THE BALLERINA'S ARE SPINNING AND MAKING ME DIZZY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm a whore for commas, sorry. This chapter gives a little bit of backstory about Michelle and death, so I hope you all enjoy. I worked super duper hard on it.

Michelle goes home at six thirty pm, her mother comes and picks her up from the hospital. Declaring that Michelle cannot spend twenty-four hours at the hospital, waiting. Cindy stays in her room, with her mother. Her father across seas, her sister couldn’t get out of college. 

 

Michelle pretends to be okay until she steps into her bedroom, her mother told her to shower, but how do you shower when your skin is already burning.

 

She gets a phone call from Ned,  _ loser number two,  _ she thinks lamely. She doesn’t answer the phone, there is no point when she knows what Ned is going to say.

 

Michelle’s phone rings on and off the rest of the night, she never answers it. Instead lays at the foot of her bed, staring at the floor. Wondering when she became  _ this.  _

 

_ I think I’m having growing pains,  _ Michelle thought while rolling over and looking out her window. The sun was already set, Michelle could hear her family wandering around the house.  _ But the doctors say I’m not going to grow anymore. Is there a way to have a growing pain when you already feel old?  _

 

Her mother opens her bedroom door the next morning, Michelle fell asleep on top of the comforter. Michelle pulls a hand up to her face to block the rays of sun shining in her eyes. She groans and falls off the bed. 

 

“Michelle,” Maria Jones says, standing in the doorway, already dressed for the day. “I think it’s about time you get out of bed.” 

 

Michelle groans in response, flashes her eyes to the digital clock on her bed stand. Eight am. It’s new years eve, her father is at work until two pm. Cole steps in the bedroom, standing behind Maria. “We’re going to pick up Frankie. And it’s time for you to get out of bed.”

 

“Mom, I’m tired,” Michelle said, crawling back into bed. “Let me sleep.” Her voice got quieter at the end, snuggling into her bed and hiding her face into a pillow. “I need sleep.”

 

Before Michelle knows it, her comforter is thrown onto the floor, and her pillow is pried out from under her head. The room is cold around Michelle, she curls up into a ball and hides her face in her arms. It burns but it’s also so cold and Michelle feels like she could just fade into the floor. 

 

“Get up,” her mother says. “Be ready in five.”

 

Cole says nothing, gives Michelle a look full of pity and leaves the room for Michelle to change. Her rooms smells bad, and when she looks into the room on the backside of her door, she looks older. Like an old person sitting in the park, waiting for company that would never arrive. She gets dressed, puts on a pair of jeans and an oversized sweater. Pulls her high tops onto her feet and leaves her hair into the messy braid she put it in the night before. Michelle does not cry when she looks in the mirror. She counts that as a win.

 

Her mother and sister are already in the car by the time she gets up, tired and feeling very hopeless, she crawls into the backseat. Cole turns around and hands Michelle a water bottle, “you haven’t eaten anything but chips and diet coke for the past day. It’s time for some water, we’ll stop and pick up breakfast on the way there. Mom said.”

 

Maria Jones says nothing in return, instead, she starts the car and turns the heater down. The news says something about Spider-man and the Avengers, Michelle grimaces. “Change the station,” she says. Cole turns it to a random station playing a football game. Her mother turns it to the classic rock. 

 

The memory of New Years is blurry, lots of TV and food. Drinking water and getting texts from Faye Moon about Cindy every hour or two. It’s nice to know that Faye knows Michelle does care.

 

Michelle falls asleep before the ball drops, she wakes up at two am, Frankie asleep on the couch and Cole sleeping on the floor. Her eyes are foggy with sleep and confusion. Her parents sleep upstairs, the moonlight shines through the slight cuts in between the false wooden blinds in the living room. The TV is still on, playing early morning news, so Michelle crawls over and turns it off. Then, she picks herself off of the floor and goes to the kitchen. 

 

Michelle remembers the day her cousin died, in a car crash. It’s unusual, Michelle thinks while leaning against the fridge, eating a pudding cup, how many tragedies Michelle has live through and yet, has never wanted an end.

 

_ He died  _ _ instantly _ _ ,  _ Raymond Jones, her father, told Michelle and Nicole while her mother talked to her older sister, the mother of the dead.  _ He did not suffer, he did not suffer _ , her father told them. 

 

As if it was supposed to be a comfort. 

 

_ When someone tells you that the dead died instantly, they hope you’re relieved that you know your loved one did not suffer,  _ Michelle wrote in an old journal that got lost over time once.  _ Sometimes you  _ **_are_ ** _ relieved, but most times, most times, you are not relieved. Instead, you are empty with the wish you could’ve been there in their last moments. Even if it means they will suffer because you will you be suffering too. _

 

She finishes the pudding cup she was eating without a spoon, thinking about her twenty-two-year-old cousin who died two years ago. He would be twenty-four in March. Michelle acts like she doesn’t know death, acts like it isn’t the third parents that tucked her into bed at night. Acts like Ben is the only dead person she knew of. Like death doesn’t have their own placemat at the dining room table of her tongue. Like death isn’t the star on top of her burning Christmas tree.

 

Little people know, that Michelle was the reason he went out that night. 

 

She had started her first period, and she was living with him at the time. Only for a month or so, still saw her parents and Cole nearly every day. But it was summer and her uncle invited her to live with him in a two bedroom, rent-controlled apartment in Queens. Only a few blocks from Peter’s house, Michelle realized. She cried, her uncle, the best person she knew, just rubbed her back and said,  _ “I’ll be back soon, don’t worry. It’s okay, it’s okay to be afraid.” _

 

He didn’t get home soon, he didn’t home at all. Got into his car and drove onto the road, listened to music on an old MP3 player, probably Fun. Or the Killers. Then he was hit by a man too drunk to be driving. One moment, her uncle was alive. With period pads in the passenger seat, ice cream and a DVD of  _ Hot Fuzz,  _ a movie Michelle still has not seen. Michelle was picked up from the apartment, stuffed toilet paper in her underwear and went to the hospital.

 

Michelle said nothing the rest of the night. Or day. Or week. Michelle hardly talked, ate, slept,  _ lived,  _ for the better part of two months. 

 

_ He died instantly,  _ Michelle thought, back in the presence. Walking up the steps of her house, while Frankie and Cole slept in the living room,  _ there was no suffering.  _

 

_ Only there was suffering.  _

 

It seems to take her years to make her way up the steps, feet dragging themselves up the hardwood steps. Michelle loved the hardwood floors of the Jones house, it was the only part of her house she thought of missing at school. Only the polished hardwood floors.

 

Michelle loved her cousin, his name was Caleb, had curly brown hair like his fathers. Was nice in all the ways Michelle can’t describe, he let Michelle wear his clothes and never said a word about it. He never said a word about it because he knew how her parents wanted her to be, sure, they loved her more than anything but that didn’t mean they didn’t have high hopes for a daughter. He let Michelle practice makeup on him, watched Saturday morning cartoons with her while eating Froot Loops or Coco puffs, sugary cereals that weren’t allowed in the Jones household. He listened to music that Michelle liked, not only classic bands but newer ones too. Oh Wonder and Arcade Fire. Sang along with Michelle to You Are Going to Hate This by The Frights. One second he was there, pouring Michelle more orange juice and playing connect four with her while he slowly but surely got her talking about her problems. The next he was gone, leaving Michelle to eat the healthy cereals that her father bought, and not wake up early enough to watch the cartoons. He was there and alive and breathing then he was gone. Six feet under in the cemetery only two subway rides away from her house.

 

Michelle says she went through the five stages of grief in the school year after Caleb died. Started on August twenty-eighth and ended on October first But she never  _ really  _ finished them.

 

Her cousin died on July twelfth. 

 

Michelle skipped the first stage of grief as though she was skipping a class. She didn’t deny that her favorite cousin died, she knew. She knew. Then hit the second one like a drunk taking a shot of tequila in a sleazy bar at two am. Cracked the shot glass up the side and got shards of glassy anger in her stomach. Michelle stayed in anger long enough to jump the third stage, only bargained for someone to take her away too. Take her to her cousin and the great grandmother who died before Michelle was born. Take her to Ben, Mary, and Richard Parker. Take her to Martin Luther King Junior and all the children who died in school shootings. Take her somewhere where she could see the dead again.

 

She left bargaining and depression hit her like a fucking truck. Like the drunk driver that killed her uncle. There was always an undertone of depression in her life, in the breakdowns over bad grades and in the hopelessness of getting out of bed each morning. In the ashy taste of all her old favorite foods, in the way she dropped friends like leaves falling off trees. But depression was suddenly her best friend. Coaxing her to skip school once again and to reread that book she had read one too many times. She was diagnosed four days before her fifteenth birthday, she started to take medication for it two weeks after her birthday. Michelle was fourteen when Caleb died, and her whole fifteenth birthday, her mind said the same thing like a broken record, “he’s not going to be here to give me a new rainbow sweater.”

 

She hit depression and stayed there. Never got to acceptance, Michelle says she did. That she has let her cousin rest, but in her mind,  _ acceptance doesn’t exist. _

 

Michelle Jones stumbles into her bedroom, with hardwood floors and a carpet Michelle found at a thrift store for twenty bucks. She lays in her bed, burrows herself deep into her bed and listens to the sound of snowflakes scratching the window to try and lull her to sleep. 

 

It doesn’t work.

 

So she fumbles for her phone and finds it after she leans her head over the side of her bed and looks at the floor. It’s there, and Michelle opens it. The password hasn’t been changed since she got the phone, along with the lock screen. It’s a comment from a poetry video Michelle watches on the bad days. Michelle opens Google Chrome to reread the same article from 2006 about the book  _ Sharp Objects,  _ but tons of articles on her phone in the recommended section catch her eye. 

 

**_Tony Stark and Pepper Potts break up !_ **

 

It reads in big letters. Michelle’s finger hovers over it for a few seconds before closing Chrome and going to her contacts. Michelle doesn’t have Stark’s number, she could get it, easily. Peter’s phone doesn’t even have a passcode on it. But she doesn’t  _ want  _ it, she feels that the last words she told him might’ve been the cause of it. 

 

Michelle calls Peter because Cindy doesn’t answer her phone on holidays and as much as Michelle loves Betty, she won’t call her at three am. Michelle could’ve called Liz, someone who Michelle has grown close to over the last year or so, but she doesn’t. Instead, she calls Peter Parker. 

 

Peter doesn’t pick up. And Michelle takes the battery out of her phone. Then she puts the battery back in but sets her phone on the floor next to her bed.

 

She falls asleep to the sound of snowflakes scratching her window and cars racing a few streets over. 

 

Michelle sleeps soundly for an until morning but wakes up from a nightmare. 

 

( _ Caleb, alive. Then his skin starts to fall off and his insides crumble like pastries. He screams and screams until Michelle jolts herself awake. _ )

 

Michelle wakes up at six am and doesn't try to sleep again, instead puts on her coat and shoes, leaves her hair down and goes outside. The morning sun shines against the white snow, she hears a laugh and someone, a young person, walks out of the apartment building down the street. Their clothes are uneven and hair a mess, but they’re smiling. Walking to a car and opening the drivers' door, throwing some stuff into the back seat, and sitting down. Michelle can’t see anything more, but she hopes. She hopes that this person, with short black hair and Mary Jane combat boots, with a crooked smile and an echoing laugh, lives a good life. Gets home safely and breathes air that’s fresh. No, Michelle does not know this person, and Michelle can hardly see them, but Michelle wants her to live a life Michelle would never get.

 

The snow freezes her hands and Michelle walks back inside quickly, after watching the young person drive away. She takes off her shoes while leaning on the doorframe to keep herself from dragging snow inside. She walks inside quietly, hides her wet snow covered Bearpaw boots in the hall closet. 

 

She calls Peter because she’s weak, because Peter will understand. Because she cannot bring this up around her family, not without someone breaking down. Her phone was cold against her face, the glass screen sending shivers down her arms and neck. This is her second time calling him, and it’s stupid because Michelle prides herself in not needing anyone. But sometimes, you just need  _ someone  _ to listen. 

 

“Peter, it’s Michelle- it’s MJ,” she speaks softly into the phone. Her family is asleep around the house, and Michelle sits in front of her closed bedroom door. “Did I wake you?”

 

“No,” his voice sounds loud compared to her quiet house. “I’ve been up for a while, sleep is difficult now, I guess,” Peter says, there is a shuffle on his side of the phone, some quiet music starts. “What’s up?”

 

Michelle sighs, shutting her eyes and stretching her legs out in front of herself. A hum makes its way up her throat, “did you go through the five stages? You know, of grief?” 

 

Might as well get straight to the point, small talk has never been her strong suit anyway.

 

“Yeah,” he says, “well. Sort of. I never really went through them slowly, yeah, yeah, I went through them. But what the doctors and family members and teachers tell you,” Peter pauses. More shuffling, the music is turned down. “It that you’ll go through them every day.”

 

Michelle runs a hand over her face and lays down on her side. Balancing her phone on the side of her face to talk. “What do you mean?” She asks quietly.

 

Everything does not feel on fire. Or ruined. Now it just feels far away. Like she can see the Christmas but can’t reach it.

 

“Like, they say when you lose someone that you’ll grow through the five stages of grief. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. But, now, after a few years and lots of time to think, I don’t think they’re things you go through in a long period of time where you experience all five of them. I guess, I guess I just experience them all, every day. Like, I’ll be going through the stages for the rest of my life.”

 

Michelle says nothing in return, just shuts her eyes and stares at the dust bunnies on her bedroom floor. 

 

“Why do you ask?” Peter questions, and he sounds so much like the eight-year-old from elementary school who ate Pringles and read the Goosebumps books. Michelle is hit with a wave of nostalgia and emptiness. 

 

“I dunno, I was just thinking about it,” Michelle says into the phone. 

 

_ I should’ve turned my back on you like you were a bullet. _

 

_ He died instantly.  _

 

“Are you okay?” Peter asks, and Michelle winces.

 

Because - _ god-  _ someone is asking, and not in the way her parents do, or in the way the school counselor does, but asking bluntly. Asking like it’s a real question and not an answer already. And Peter has known pain, nearly everyone who is close to Michelle has known pain, she realizes while putting her hand on the phone and rolling onto her back. She looks up at the ceiling of her bedroom, sticky glow in the dark stars lay on it. They don’t glow anymore, but they’re there. 

 

“Not really,” Michelle laughs, but it’s bitter and too watery. “No.”

 

“What’s going on, MJ?” 

 

_ I hurt. I hurt a lot. _

 

“I don’t know,” she whispers while pushing down a sob. “I’m sad.”

 

Peter says nothing. The silence sounds like Caleb's voice. Sounds like Ben singing  _ We Will Rock You.  _ sounds like her mother humming along to  _ Mary Poppins.  _ Sounds like her father whispering to Michelle late at night, telling her that it’s gonna be a new day. Sounds like Nicole tapping her feet while taking off her makeup. Sounds like Mrs.Flores typing at her computer while looking up at Michelle every once and while. Sounds like the strangers laugh down the street. Sounds like Ned putting the last lego into place. Sounds like Cindy eating the hospital food even though she hates the taste but she ate because her mother was there. Sounds like Tony Stark talking about Beatrice. Sounds like something so close yet so far away.

 

“You should come over tomorrow, school doesn’t start for another few days. We could have a sleepover,” Peter suggests. And as disastrous as Michelle feels, as tired as she feels. As slurred as everything seems, the idea of sleeping on the floor in the Parker living room, watching movies or rewatching _ How I Met Your Mother,  _ eating junk food and playing card games with May, sound so comforting and  _ hopeful _ , that Michelle cannot pass up the offer.

 

“Okay,” she mutters, “that sounds okay.”

 

Frankie and Cole don’t wake up until Michelle sprays them with a water bottle. Her mother wakes up around ten and starts to make breakfast. Her father wakes up when breakfast is ready, and they all eat. Sitting in front of the TV in the living room while watching  _ The Office.  _ The whole day is calm, Frankie spends another night. Michelle tells her parents about the sleepover with Peter, and they accept it. They don’t make any jokes, instead, they say, “It’s good that you’re going out, Michelle.”

 

May and Peter pick Michelle up around noon on the second of January, Peter knocks on the Jones’ front door. Cole answers the door while Michelle packs her toothbrush and puts on her hightops. 

 

“You must be Peter,” Cole says, the door swung open and cold air breezing its way inside the house. Maria Jones walks out from the living room where she sat doing paperwork. 

 

“Hello, Peter,” she greets, smiling. “I’m Maria.” She sticks out her hand for Peter to shake, and Peter shakes it. His hand has a scar from the concrete steps, that will go away soon, but Peter shakes her hand while Cole leans against the doorframe. 

 

“It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Jones,” Peter says politely. Maria laughs and pulls her hand away from his. Sets a soft hand on Cole’s head. “Please, call me Maria.”

 

“Maria! Come here!” Frankie yells from the kitchen, Maria gives Peter a face of fake annoyance then walks to the kitchen. “It was nice to meet you, Peter.” 

 

Michelle appears out from behind the door, with a backpack thrown over her shoulder and long jacket unbuttoned. Her hair is back in french braids and she smirks at Peter. 

 

“You ready?” Peter asks, and Michelle nods. She already said goodbye to Frankie and her mother. 

 

“Bye Cole, save me some brownies,” Michelle says, before walking past Peter and out into the walkway. Peter, waves before following Michelle.

 

Cole watches this all, and smiles, knowingly. 

 

“Hello, May,” Michelle greets, setting her backpack inside the backseat before crawling inside the car. May smiles at Michelle while Peter gets inside the passengers' seat. Turning down the radio, May speaks, “how are you doing, sweetheart?” 

 

“I’m okay, how are you?”

 

“Oh you know,” May says while waving her hand and starting to drive. “I’m decent.”

 

The ride to the Parkers’ apartment is fairly quiet, May hums along to the song Peter plays over the speakers from his phone. The car swirls around hot air and Michelle feels her hands go damp with sweat.

 

They drive down the street where Caleb died. 

 

Michelle doesn’t say anything about it. Just looks out the window while  _ Goodbye Yellow Brick Road  _ plays and music floods her ears. 

 

“So MJ,” Peter starts, turning around to face Michelle. “We’re gonna watch Ocean’s Eleven and you can’t stop it.” Peter smiles at her, and it’s nice. The shifting inside her, the bones sliding against each other and heart beating just a little bit faster. Her fingertips going numb and her soul floating away from her body. Like the smile that Peter gives Michelle, the one where his hair is messy and his eyes squint just a  _ little  _ bit, should be a secret.  _ You are the smile I keep secret, the first hero wanna be of my youth. _

 

“I’ve never seen it,” Michelle says, “Isn’t the dude from  _ Fight Club  _ in it?” 

 

Peter nods viciously, “you’re gonna love it,” he declares. 

 

“Wait, so he just lets it happen?” Michelle exclaims while the credits start to roll. Michelle was angry that Terry just let himself get robbed of millions, even with the car following Tess, Daniel, and Rusty out, she was mad. “He just lost  _ millions,  _ and he doesn’t even go to the police! I demand to see what happens next, I need to know.”

 

Peter laughs and Michelle throws popcorn at him. Peter stands up and takes the DVD out of the blu-ray player, quietly laughing at Michelle huffing at the movie. When he lets out a laugh a little too loud, she throws a pillow at him. He says  _ OW!  _ But Michelle knows it doesn’t hurt.

 

“There is a second movie, Ocean’s Twelve, but it’s not that good. The one that came out recently, Ocean’s Eight, is really good,” Peter says while putting the DVD away. Michelle lays back onto the couch and sighs. “Stupid.”

 

Peter nods, “Maybe a little bit.”

 

May comes out then, smiling and holding her wallet and keys. “I feel like breakfast food, you guys wanna go out?” 

 

Peter looks to Michelle for an answer, all three of them are wearing pajamas and Michelle loosened her braids, took out some of the bobby pins. She sits up and looks at May worriedly, “are you sure? I can pay for myself-”

 

May laughs before Michelle can finish, “nonsense. You’re our guest. Get some shoes and coats on, don’t bother getting dressed. I’m gonna start the car, meet me downstairs when you’re ready,” May says with a smile.

 

“You’re aunt’s really nice,” Michelle tells Peter while putting on her shoes. “She reminds me of Caleb.” 

 

Peter looks up from tying his shoes to give Michelle a questioning glance, “who’s Caleb?”

 

Michelle’s hands freeze. Her eyes become black and her heart howls with agony. Her Christmas folds into itself, curling to a crumpled ball small enough to fit inside Michelle’s palm. “He was my cousin.” 

 

_ Was,  _ Peter thinks.  _ A word that controls people’s lives. I  _ **_was_ ** _ with her. He  _ **_was_ ** _ alive. It  _ **_was_ ** _ something. Was. Was. And was.  _

 

“Was?” Peter asks because he wants to know. It’s almost funny, that out of the two of them she is becoming more of the mystery. 

 

Michelle nods, “was,” she repeats.

 

They say nothing more as they walk downstairs and into the car, Peter sits in the backseat this time. May already had the radio on the classic rock station, a station that Ben listened too, Michelle realizes. 

 

They go to a small family restaurant that isn’t busy. May smiles a lot and orders a milkshake each for all three of them. While they wait for their food, May asks Michelle about her life. They haven’t talked more than a few sentences here and there.

 

“Michelle,” May starts before Peter cuts her off. 

 

“She likes going by MJ,” he says. Michelle and Peter are sitting on the same side of the booth, Michelle gawks at him when he says that. May does too, by the looks of it. 

 

“What!” Peter exclaims, “you do!”

 

May and Michelle share a smile before May asks, “do you still draw?”

 

Michelle nods, “yeah. I try to, at least. Sometimes, sometimes it’s difficult to pick up the pencil and work, I guess.”

 

May hums in response, she smiles in a bittersweet way. “I remember, that Mary went through a tough time of painting, she was a painter. After Peter was born, she couldn’t paint. She drew, but everything she drew ended up being something related to Peter,” May laughed slightly. When Michelle took a chance and glanced over at Peter, he was entranced. Wanting to know more about this woman who was his mother.

 

“And one day, Ben and I were babysitting Peter, she started to paint. It was Mary, Richard, and Peter. The painting is beautiful, it doesn’t fit in our living room. But somewhere in our storage space, is all of Mary’s paintings. Neatly wrapped.”

 

The food came then, and the conversation went from talking about the dead to talking about the Ocean’s series. 

 

Michelle doesn’t sleep in the living room, she sleeps on the top bunk of his bunk bed. The sheets smell like laundry and something Michelle can’t help but describe as  _ boy.  _ Peter has a bunch of framed photos in his room, along with lego sets sitting on shelves and his desk. Michelle sits on the bed, legs hung over the side in the air while slouching. Peter sits on his desk chair, spinning back and forth. 

 

“What’s that?” Michelle asks, pointing at a polished rock sitting on a small pillow on one of the shelves above his desk. Next to it is a bunch of stacked books, all old classics collecting dust with tiny tabs that are fading multi-colored. A framed photo of who Michelle can only guess are his parents, happy and gorgeous. He has his mothers’ smile. The framed photo sits atop a photo album and next to it is a painting. Leaning back against the white wall, dusty. The painting is of ballerinas with the letters  _ M.P  _ in the corner. But it takes something from Michelle. Prys the breath from her lungs and her mind is full of thoughts of it.

 

“It’s a star,” Peter says. “Ben, my dad and I found it when I was little. But it’s been broken down for quite some time.” He stands up and grabs the  _ star  _ from the shelf. Hands it to Michelle, she holds it like it is a gift. Something priceless. “Because too many people wished on it and that’s a lot of pressure for one little star.” 

 

Michelle runs her fingers over one of the jagged edges, thought of a tiny Peter, hold the star and his uncle and father crouching down to his height. Telling him about the star, who granted too many wishes and lost all of its magic.

 

“Truth or dare?” Michelle whispers to him later in the night. 

 

“Truth,” Peter says, Michelle leans over the side of the bed. He’s looking up at her, and she reaches down to touch his hand. His hands are warm, calloused with stubby fingernails. 

 

“Wimp,” she chuckles. “Do you still talk to Liz?”

 

Peter waves their locked hands throughout the air. She grips on a little tighter while Peter sighs. “We said we were going to, we never really did.” He runs a thumb over her knuckles, it’s comforting in a way. Not like the time she held hands with the boy at the eighth-grade dance, that was sweaty and awkward. It wasn’t much different from holding Cole’s hand while crossing the street or playing in the park. 

 

“Truth or dare?” It’s his turn to ask now, and Michelle thinks about it for a second.

 

“Truth.”

 

“Who’s the wimp now,” he jokes. “What happened to Caleb?” he asks.

 

And it stings.

 

“He died a few years ago,” Michelle whispers. “Car accident,” she says as if that explains all the pain. 

 

Peter nods in response. The stinging in her chest doesn’t go away. It stays there, jabbing at her heart and the inside of her skin. As if it is trying to make a hole to crawl out of.

 

“Have you ever seen your moms paintings?” Michelle doesn’t bother asking  _ truth or dare, _ she wants to know. And Michelle has never been very good at self-control, at letting people come to her instead of her prying them open and shaking the secrets out of them.

 

“Some of them, only the small ones. I’ve been meaning to look at them for a while now but…” he trails off. Michelle knows why. 

 

“We should go. Look at them, I mean,” Michelle states bluntly, squeezing his hand. Peter stares at her like she’s crazy. 

 

“It’s nearing two am,” he says.

 

“Your point?” 

 

Peter stands up without letting go of her hand. Michelle looks at him with the light coming from the moon throughout the weak curtains. “Okay,” he says. “Let's go.”

 

And so they go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank ! you ! for ! reading !  
> this isn't the end fyi, the new chapter will be out soon xx


	7. HOW PAINFUL IT IS TO NOT REALIZE IT'S LOVE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey y'all!! hope you enjoy this new chapter, i worked hard on it (as normal) and there's some liz&michelle content in this one!! along with a young a memory that is up to you to decide what it means to michelle. once again, this is not the end! new chapter will be up soon!  
> have fun reading !

They leave a note for May and took the keys to the unit. Slip on their shoes and coats wordlessly. Both of them keep their phones with them, and sneak out of the apartment and down into the bottom floor. Where the storage unit was. May and Peter (and Ben) had been living there so long, they got a storage unit in the apartment building that cost little. It was lucky, not the luck the Parkers’ would’ve wanted. But luck.

 

“This way,” Peter spoke, walking down a dark staircase. Peter walked down a few of the steps before turning around and looking back at Michelle. “MJ? You coming?”

 

She sighed, “I don’t _like_ the dark.”

 

“You’re scared of the dark?”

 

“ _No,_ ” Michelle snapped at Peter. “I just don’t _like_ it.”

 

He held his hand out for her, palm open and smiling slightly. “C’mon, I’m right here.”

 

Michelle rolled her eyes, “Oh yes, my savior.” But she grasped his hand in hers anyway. She wasn’t scared of the dark, she was scared of what was _in_ the dark. Of what could jump out and steal her away. Of the past tangling her up, knotting rope around her ankles and wrists and forcing her to watch a long everlasting movie of every single awful thing that had happened in her life. Of the death of Caleb and the funeral of Ben, the daisy tucked behind May’s ear. Of the face that the person behind the counter gives her each time she got her meds refilled. Of the face her mother gave Michelle when she cut her hair in the bathroom. The feeling of her blood boiling when she punches Flash, the idea that Cindy might’ve tried to kill herself. Of the tears streaming down Liz’s face when she moved. Everything flickering before her, with her eyes pried open and being forced to watch.

 

Peter leads the way, a flashlight from his phone creating a dim yellow gleaming light down a stale hallway. Doors with numbers on them and locked doors. Cobwebs hanging in the corners of the doorframes, the only noise is their breathing and the soft patter of their shoes on the carpet floor. Her hand holds onto his tightly, shutting her eyes every few seconds to shut out the bad thoughts. “Here it is.”

 

They stand in front of the door, eight-five-zero. Peter unlocks it and lets go of her hand while doing so, her hand feels so much colder without his intertwined with it. Peter walks in and searches for a light, the light is harshly bright and Michelle sees dots for a few seconds before adjusting to it.

 

It’s full of furniture covered with white cloth and paintings covered with brown paper. Boxes stacked up in threes or fours closed by folding the tabs. Peter grabbed one of the boxes and opened it while sitting on some furniture. Dust flew, Michelle coughed but Peter just opened the box.

 

Inside there were photos. Tons and tons of them. None of them in photo albums, none of them neatly stacked. But chaos. Photos piled into the box hastily, Michelle watched as Peter reached his hand in and grabbed a bunch of them.

 

Michelle doesn’t look at the photos, it seems too much like an intimate moment with Peter and his past. Michelle wanders to the other side of the small room, running her hands over the boxes. She pulls a medium sized one out from a pile, trying to be as careful as possible. She leaned on the floor and opened the box, peeling off the top of it and setting it down beside her. Inside, after Michelle unwrapped the brown paper, were glass flowers. Dust tinted them, and Michelle wiped her thumb over the glossy petals to clean it off. Michelle started to line them up gently on the floor next to her. The light reflected off them, and most of them were only a four or five inches long.

 

“What’d you find?” Peter asked, catching Michelle out of her daze.

 

Michelle looked over at Peter, sitting on a dusty, old, white sheet covered couch. With a huge box sitting in his lap and hands rifling through photos. He wasn’t looking at her, head down as if he was praying, looking into the abyss of the brown box with wilted and soft edges.

 

When she didn’t answer quickly enough, his head snapped up and looked at Michelle. “What’d you find?”

 

“Glass flowers,” Michelle spoke while picking up her favorite one. White petals and green leaves, with a brown stem and dust tucked safely in between the petals. “They’re beautiful.”

 

Peter sets the box to the side of him and walks over to Michelle, looks at the flowers already laying on the floor. “Do you know who’s they are?” Peter shook his head, “no, May doesn’t like having glass knick-knacks in the house.”

 

Michelle continued to take out the glass flowers, Peter stood up and went back to look at the photos. Something at the bottom of the box caught her eyes, blue lines with yellowing paper from time. On the outside of it, _Peter_ was written in smooth neat letters. “When was the last time you were in here?”

 

Peter shrugged, “I dunno, maybe a few years? Ben and I used to clean it up every April but..” He trailed off. It’s not like Peter had to finish the sentence anyway.

 

“Have you ever opened this box?”

 

Peter shook his head, “May must’ve put it in here recently.”

 

“I wouldn’t say _recently_ ,” Michelle said. The room had a constant decay to it, smelling of dead memories and broken nostalgia. Peeling wall paint and boxes threatening to tip over any second. Dust and hazy deja vu hiding in corners and under ripped cardboard, just waiting to be seen. The light, flickering every few seconds, was something that came straight out of a horror movie. Michelle partly thought that this room didn’t exist until now, that all this rotting nothingness, just appeared right before they opened the door. Like a magic trick.

 

“Peter,” Michelle said, standing up with the stale paper in her hand. She sat next to him, handing the letter with a shaking hand. “I think this is for you.”

 

He took the letter with a soft brush of hands and opened the small paper with a ripple. Michelle stands up and tries to walk away to give Peter privacy, “don’t go.”

 

Michelle nodded, “I’ll stay.”

 

When Peter finishes reading the letter, he shuts his eyes and lets his hand holding the paper fall to his lap. Michelle finds his empty hand and wraps hers around it.

 

They stay like that until May comes downstairs and finds them, staring at the floor with mournful expressions, eyes filled with lost and something like **_love_ **.

 

(Peter doesn’t realize that he didn’t look at his mothers' paintings until later. But the feeling of Michelle’s palm in his own is almost worth it.)

 

May makes them go back to bed, sends them upstairs to the apartment while she cleans up. Peter, insists on having the box full of glass flowers in his room. He shoves the letter in his pajama pants pocket. Michelle knows May saw, but May said nothing so Michelle said nothing too.

 

They don’t go back to sleep. Instead, they lay on the floor of the kitchen with the overhead light on, Michelle’s idea, of course. It’s not the same as Michelle’s house, but it’s close enough.

 

“I don’t understand the appeal of this,” Peter says while laying down. “It just makes my eyes hurt, and the floor isn’t exactly comfy.”

 

Michelle sighs, frustrated. “ _God,_ it’s not about being comfortable. It’s about, like, phasing out,” she hisses. Her eyes glazed over, staring at the gruff kitchen light with her hands resting at her sides. _This._ Michelle wants to say, peeling open her skin to make room for Peter so he can feel it too. _Is why it’s nice. Why it’s worth the pain._

 

Peter sits up a little bit, like doing a curl up in gym class. He looks over at Michelle, twisting his body to view her. Michelle’s eyes are hooded, glassy, her head lolls back and forth, just a little bit. Her shirt rides up near her waist so he can see a patch of smooth skin. He resists the urge to set his hand on it.

 

He lays back down, ten minutes later, May walks in holding a box. The flower box. Peter shoots up to look at it, but Michelle can’t even hear it. Everything sounds like voices under water. Far away and slurred, drawn with a heavy hand. May looks down at the girl laying down on her kitchen tile. In a split second, she crouches down on her knees and shakes Michelle’s shoulder.

 

Michelle comes to life like Mary did when May and her were little, waking up to go to school. Her eyes focusing and mouth yawning. It makes May like Michelle a little more than she already did.

 

“Michelle, sweetheart, c’mon. Let's get you up.” May hisses something at Peter, who was rifling through the flower box. He walks over and helps Michelle up and onto her feet. Michelle stumbles forwards and crashes into Peter, dizzy and confused, she rubs her head as if someone hit her. Michelle turns around to smile at May. It’s stiff and tired.

 

Michelle Jones fell back into Peter, losing her footing and eyes not being able to focus on one object. She’s picked up off her feet quickly, taken to the couch and sat down. “I’ll get you some water,” someone said.

 

It’s all so loud.

 

Michelle falls asleep before they can give the water to her, focusing on one blurry vase with deep red roses inside. She looks at it, listening to Peter shake some meds out of a bottle and May fill a cup up with water, until everything goes back and she’s submerged by dreams.

 

 _A dream. Peter, spider suit ripped and blood spills out from the cuts deep into his skin. He looks at Michelle, yelling,_ **_turn around. Don’t let it get you!_ ** _Michelle shoots awake just as a cold hand with long blank fingernails and moonlit skin clasps her._

 

Michelle Jones wakes up to the sound of a phone ringing, it’s not her own. She opens her eyes to find her head laying on a pillow in Peter’s lap, his hand is running through her hair, eyes focused on the TV playing an episode of _Saved By The Bell._ A quilt covers the better part of her lower body, and Peter looks down when he realizes she’s awake.

 

Peter smiles at her. And the shifting inside of her stops, instead, something cracks open. Is thrown against the wall of her mind and breaks in two.

 

The phone stops ringing and she hears May pick it up and talk in her smooth voice. Michelle readjusts herself to face the TV. Peter doesn’t move his hand, just continues to mindlessly play with her hair. Michelle hears Peter hum along to the theme song, fingers fiddling with the edges of her split ends.

 

It hits Michelle with power, taking Michelle back to when she was eight and in the wave pool at a water park she forgot the name of. Too small to keep her own, strong wave knocking her off her small feet and back into the water. Gasping for air, arms flailing and eyes opening, getting stung by the strong chlorine. Getting picked up by a woman in her late twenties early thirties, just a good person, grabbing Michelle by her arms and lifting her out of the water. Wiping her dark hair out of Michelle’s eyes and picking her up. Walking out of the wave pool, and setting Michelle down on the chairs in a grassy area. Wrapping a towel warmed by the sun around Michelle’s frame. “ _Breathe”_ the woman had told her. Bending down to Michelle’s level and putting a delicate hand on Michelle’s hunched shoulder, “ _breathe, little girl. You won’t be able to go back to swimming if you don’t_ **_breathe._** _”_

 

 _“Come on,”_ the women said again. Dark skin with darker hair and eyes the color of two am snack breaks. “ _You gotta focus on your breathing.”_ Her voice was raspy. Her swimming suit was a two-piece with a white t-shirt over it. It had wording on it, _choose love,_ it said.

 

 _“Little girl,”_ she said when Michelle got her breathing stable and coughed out all the water she swallowed. “ _You’re one of the strong ones.”_ Michelle saw Caleb walk towards them, out of the wave pool and to Michelle and the woman. He was sixteen then, looking at Michelle and this stranger with a worrying look.

 

“MJ,” he said that day, “let’s go back into the wave pool.” And the woman turned around, taller than Caleb looking down at him with power. “This girl isn’t going back into the wave pool.”

 

Caleb scoffed, “Come on, MJ. Let’s go.”

 

When the woman looked down at Michelle with a look in her eye, something like sisterhood in her eyes. In her movements. “I don’t wanna go back into the wave pool, Caleb.”

 

When Caleb and Michelle walked to the tube slides, Michelle glimpsed over her shoulder and saw the woman watching them walk away. Michelle realized that she still had the women's towel on her shoulders, she turned around and ran towards her. Feet hitting the hot pavement and ignoring Caleb yelling for her.

 

“I still have your towel,” Michelle told the woman, shoving the towel towards her.

 

The woman took the towel and smiled, “y’know, the wave pool just gets worse with age. Everyone who says they enjoy it is lying.”

 

Michelle smiled up at her, and turned around and ran back to Caleb. What the woman gave her that day, with the towel and pulling her out of the wave pool, was something like  ** _love._**

 

Something like what she was starting to feel for Peter Parker.

 

“MJ,” Peter says, looking down at Michelle. “Wanna make some brownies?”

 

If Michelle spoke, she would definitely tell Peter what she feels for him. So she just nods and sits up. She feels suddenly cold, and tries to push that feeling down while they walk into the kitchen.

 

While Michelle sits on the counter she watches Peter crack an egg over the mixing bowl, it reminds her of a question she had for him when she found out he was Spider-man. “Do you lay eggs?”

 

“ _Why does everyone ask that_?”

 

“Others have asked _that_?” Michelle laughs, and May, who is still on the phone, walks into the kitchen to grab her purse from the table. She smiles at Michelle and Peter’s laughing. May moves the phone away from her mouth to talk to Michelle, “be careful, okay, Michelle? Don’t wanna wear you out.” Then May smiles and walks back into her room.

 

Peter picks the conversation back up like May didn’t just walk in, “Ned asked it.”

 

Michelle laughs even harder.

 

The brownies are half burnt by the time they take them out of the oven, Michelle and Peter got distracted by a card game. Peter didn’t know how to play bullshit, so Michelle had to teach him. He sucked at it, wasn’t good at lying and he couldn’t say the _word_ bullshit. He acted like he didn’t know what cursing was, when Michelle was, in fact there in eighth grade when Peter screamed out the word _fuck_ in the middle of class during a science project.

 

They stop playing the card game quickly, instead opting to sit at the kitchen table in quiet. Picking at the plate from brownies and sighing every once and awhile. Peter catches her eyes, and Michelle feels like someone is grabbing her from the present and pulling her into the past.

 

_The first time Liz and Michelle spent time with one another outside of school, Liz confessed something._

 

_“I don’t think I could even imagine marrying a boy. They’re all so, so, so...”_

 

_And Michelle let Liz trail off, in front of the movie theater after seeing the movie Thoroughbreds. They sat on the ground, leaning on the wall, and Liz had leaned on Michelle’s shoulder. Shutting her eyes and they sat like that for a long while. Then they got up and walked to Liz’s car, the one she was borrowing from her mother, they didn’t drive home but drove around town. To the ice cream shop near the mall, while licking strawberry ice cream Michelle confessed something too. Told Liz, just as gently, just as earnestly.  “I can’t imagine myself getting through high school without killing myself.”_

 

_Liz looked at her, with the same eyes Peter was looking at her with._

 

“MJ,” Peter whispered, bringing his hand up to cup her cheek. She leaned into his touch like a touch starved cat, wanting more, needing more. He was about to say something more but dropped his hand a half a second before May walked out. Michelle knew it was because of something with his stupid fucking spider abilities.

 

Her phone rang, and she picked it up quickly. Avoiding eye contact with either of the Parker’s.

 

“Hi sweetheart,” her mother greeted. “What time do you wanna come home?”

 

Michelle sighs. She wishes Peter and her had more time.

 

Raymond Jones picks Michelle up two hours after her mother called her, he texted Michelle that he was waiting so she packed up and said goodbye to May. Thanking her over and over again for letting Michelle come over. May waved her off, announcing that Michelle was welcome anytime. Peter insisted on walking her downstairs, Michelle didn’t put up a fight.

 

“Here,” he said when they reached the last level of stairs, he took something out of his pocket. “I want you to have this.” He hands her the rock - _star -_ by his bed.

 

“Peter…”

 

“I want you to have it MJ,” he whispers, taking her hand and placing the rock in her clammy palm. “You’re my star.”

 

Michelle fought back tears, touched the smooth rock with ragged edges. “Thank you, Peter.”

 

Her father honks the car horn, getting impatient. Michelle grabs Peter and pulls him into a tight hug, digging her face into his neck. He smells like chocolate, the shampoo he uses and his bedroom. When they pull apart, Michelle sees galaxies in his eyes. He brings his hand from her waist up to her cheek, “MJ.”

 

Michelle leans her forehead against his, “Peter.”

 

Her fingertips felt like they were on fire, bringing her hands from around his neck to his face. Touching his face, running her thumbs over his cheekbones. He breathes softly and the hand that was remaining on her waist held on tighter. His eyes flutter shut and Michelle studies his face. He’s truly beautiful.

 

“I have to go,” Michelle whispers. Peter nods, eyes opening. He knows. Peter understands.

 

Michelle hands drop from his face and grab the straps of her backpack to ground herself. She can feel a red blush streaking her cheeks. Peter looks disheveled, hair a mess and fingertips still pointing at her. Like she was a paperclip and he was a magnet.

 

“I’ll see you tomorrow, MJ,” Peter says, reminding Michelle that school starts back up the next day. The world seemed to pause sometimes when she was with Peter. Something Michelle couldn’t explain.

 

“Bye, Peter.” Then she was off into the real real world, away from Peter Parker and to her fathers’ car. The star Peter gave her, sitting in her pocket. Shining brighter and brighter each time Peter popped up in her thoughts.

 

_“Do you want to die, Michelle?” Liz asked, mint bonbon ice cream malt forgotten about. Sweat stains Michelle’s upper lip, the stems of hair that frames Liz’s face, stick to her cheeks in the humidity of late summer. Liz wears blue mom jeans and a black button up with blue polka dots._

 

_“No. I just, I can’t see myself living through high school.” Michelle ducks her head away, melted ice cream makes its way down her hands. Michelle throws the half eaten ice cream cone in the trash can a foot away, she grabs napkins and tries to clean off her hands. Liz hands her lemon hand sanitizer from her purse._

 

_After Michelle cleans her hands, holding on the small bottle of hand sanitizer in her palms. Liz grabs both of Michelle’s sticky hands in her own, gripping onto them tightly._

 

_“Don’t go. Not yet.”_

 

Michelle visits her old middle school the next day. Cole, who is an eighth grader there, had to stay after school and their parents don’t let Cole walk home alone. So Michelle was told to pick her up. Michelle feels so much bigger in her old middle school.

 

Mrs. Flores is twenty-six now, her hair is longer and her eyeliner is sharp. She wears heels and dangly earrings. Her room looks the same, classical music playing from the radio, her desk in the same spot. A framed photo of her wife on the windowsill by her desk, a glass bowl filled with butterscotch. Mrs. Flores had read her writing for honors ELA once, smiled and told Michelle, “you have such a deep and creative voice, Michelle.”

 

A girl with red hair and arms covered in freckles, maybe in grade seven, sits at one of the tables in Mrs. Flores’ room. She doesn’t look up when Michelle walks in, black converse patting against the tile, hair pulled back in a ponytail with a blue scrunchie Cindy gave her. Wearing leggings and a long black and white flannel. She remembers it’s Caleb’s, a pain hits her chest.

 

“Mrs. Flores?”

 

The teacher looks up, smiling widely. “Michelle! I’ve been waiting for you,” she says. Like she always knew Michelle was going to come back, like she had some sort of magic.

 

The redheaded student looks up and waves at Michelle, she takes out a phone and puts in headphones. Like she knew too.

 

Mrs. Flores stands up, heels clicking on the floor and pulls Michelle into a hug. It’s odd, to hug a teacher. But Mrs. Flores makes it like something always worth doing, something that isn’t weird. But kind, but routine.

 

“How’s high school?” Mrs. Flores asks when she steps away from Michelle, keeping her hands on Michelle’s shoulders. Her nails are yellow now, still long and perfect.

 

“It’s,” Michelle looks off. “It’s high school, you know.”

 

Mrs. Flores nods knowingly, “high school is a hard time for everyone.”

 

“Oh! I have a book for you,” the teacher says, walking towards her desk and opening a drawer. She handed Michelle a book with no jacket and blue hardcover. “It’s The Girls by Emma Cline. I read it a few weeks ago, thought you might like it.”

 

Michelle was convinced that Mrs. Flores was some kind of magic, always having a faint knowledge of what would happen next in her life. But, Michelle knew, her life wasn’t always like that.

 

“ _I should’ve turned my back on you like you were the bullet."_

 

“I underlined a few quotes I knew you might like, the book is loosely based on The Manson Family. Not really the murders, but everything around it. I just _knew_ that you’d like it.” Mrs. Flores smiled. And the whole world stopped to look at it, Michelle always felt attacked whenever Mrs. Flores was with her. Like her beauty was something to hypnotize her. Later, after Michelle read The Girls, there would be a quote to perfectly describe how she felt towards Mrs. Flores.

 

_I took her beauty personally._

 

When Michelle leaves the school, Mrs. Flores will give her a hug and Cole a wide smile. Will tuck a Hershey's almond into Michelle’s palm with soft eyes. The redhead at the table will wave as they walk out, watching after, as Mrs. Flores walked to her desk. As if the redhead could find something wrong in Mrs. Flores’ perfectly timed movements.

 

_“I can’t explain it,” Michelle told Liz. frowning at the sun, trees wilting down towards the ground as if it was being pushed. A couple sitting under the tree, the women's head in her boyfriend's lap, him mindlessly playing with her hair while she read from a book. And Michelle, watching them with an intense stare, wondered why the girl was with him. When he was pulling on her hair and every few seconds she hid her pain with a smile. To please a man, like most girls are taught to do._

 

_“Everyone is telling me that I’m having a fun time, and there is no way to explain I’m not.” Michelle licked her lips and looked over at Liz. There was no pity in her face, instead, her face was painted with something Michelle couldn’t quite place. Michelle wiped tears from her eyes. The man leaned down to kiss his girlfriend, and she stopped reading. Obeying his want wordlessly._

 

_“I wish I was uncomfortable. Uncomfortable would be so much better than what I am feeling.”_

 

Before bed, she gets a call from Peter. Michelle picks it up halfway through the second word of her ringtone.

 

“Are you free this weekend?” Peter asked, it was Wednesday now. The weekend seemed so close, time was going by so fast.

 

Michelle nodded, only to realize he couldn’t see it. “Yeah, I am. Why?”

 

“Mr. Stark wants me to go upstate this weekend, he said you should come. He said that he wants you to come,” Peter said. The star he gave her - _you’re my star_ \- sat on her nightstand. In front of the photo of Caleb and Michelle at Christmas the year before he died.

 

“I’ll go.”

 

It’s a mistake. She shouldn’t go. It’s selfish, to want Peter in the way she does. To want to see every side of him, the one with May, one with Ned, Stark, the one where he’s Spider-man.

 

Mostly she wants to know if he acts differently when he’s around Michelle, _herself._

 

“Yeah?”

 

Her tree lights up at the sound of excitement in his voice.

 

“Yeah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank's for reading!! i love reading your comments and getting kudos so do that if you want!  
> also yes, michelle asked everybody to call her MJ because caleb called her that. i just thought it was a nice idea, don't @ me


	8. WE HAVE ALWAYS BEEN INEVITABLE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all enjoy the new chapter! i love it a lot!

 

“It’s a date.”

 

“It’s not a date.”

 

Cindy laughs as a response. They were sitting in the coffee shop a few blocks away from school, they walked there the after the dismissal bell rang. Met up in the front of the school, heavy backpacks filled with books and homework. Crumpled up money in the front pockets of their pants. They took to sitting on a couch by one of the windows with the logo painted on it. Cindy was sitting on the couch, criss-cross while working on something for sociology while Michelle sat on the floor, paper, and books on the small table, studying for a French quiz the next day. 

 

“It’s so a date,” Cindy declared taking a sip from her hot chocolate. 

 

(Cindy and Michelle don’t talk about the hospital. It’s not the time or the place. But Michelle notices how Cindy is only wearing long sleeves and how her mother seems to constantly worry about Cindy. Michelle tries to pretend that she couldn’t have stopped this, that Cindy being filled with pain isn’t her fault. But it feels like hers. Sometimes Michelle wants to pull the sadness out of Cindy and eat it herself. Michelle would take all of her friends' pain if it meant she could see Cindy smile without it being blank at the eyes.)

 

“Are you going out on a date, Michelle?” Tammy, a waitress in her fifties with a calm presence and soft eyes. She had been working there for years, she was there the first time Michelle walked inside the cafe when she was nine years old with her babysitter. 

 

“No, I’m not. Don’t listen to Cindy, she’s going insane,” Michelle says, when she looks from her homework she sees that Tammy is smiling. Refilling Michelle’s mug with coffee, and setting down a blueberry muffin for Cindy. 

 

Tammy leaned down and tucked a strand of hair that was falling in Michelle’s face behind her ear. She smiled softly at Michelle, the same one she has been giving Michelle for eight years. Tammy was the first person who gave Michelle coffee, she didn’t ask. Just set a cup of coffee in front of Michelle the week after Ben died, Tammy wasn’t at the funeral. But she knew, like Mrs. Flores knew, or like how May knew, or Michelle’s mother knew. Tammy had this secret sense for Michelle. Tammy told Michelle after the young girl took her first sip of coffee, nose scrunching in disgust, “you’ll get used to it, honey.” 

 

Tammy told Michelle that coffee was only for coffee shops and home, “don’t drink coffee at school,” she told Michelle in freshman year before school started when Michelle was ordering a coffee to-go for school. “It’s not professional, and you’re a professional girl.” Tammy then disappeared into the back and walked out a few seconds later holding a to-go cut. “Drink this. It’s on the house.” Tammy winked and walked over to serve some police officers. 

 

“So,” Tammy started looking around the nearly empty cafe. “Who are you going out on a date with?”

 

Cindy just laughed.

 

“It’s not a date, and his name is Peter Parker.” Michelle stirs her coffee with a tiny spoon before taking a drink of it. She has learned how to not scrunch up her nose, how to like the taste of coffee. How to like the taste of tea.

 

“Peter Parker,” Tammy draws out. “Is he nice?”

 

“He’s very nice, owns a lot of stupid pun t-shirts,” Cindy answers without looking up from her computer. “She blushes whenever he looks at her.”

 

“Bullshit! I do not!” Michelle nearly yells. Cindy laughs louder than before.

 

“My mother told me to never trust a man,” Tammy speaks. “Especially if he hates to dance.” 

 

Cindy and Michelle share a look, thinking about the only time they’ve seen Peter dance. He didn’t even dance, he left his beautiful date and ran to save Queens.

 

“Be careful, Michelle,” Tammy tells Michelle seriously. “You deserve this.” 

 

Tammy walks away, serving a woman in a red dress who had just walked in. Cindy said nothing, and Michelle sat wondering what Tammy meant.

 

Cindy left before Michelle did, telling Michelle she needed to catch her train soon. Michelle nodded, told Cindy she loved her and gave her a quick hug, watching as Cindy walked fastly wearing a stocking cap, facing the wind, on her way to the subway. 

 

“Michelle, it’s nearly eight thirty. Go home.” Tammy picks up Michelle’s half empty coffee mug and shuts her French book, giving Michelle half a second to yank her fingers from being snapped on. The coffee shop isn’t empty, a few other people milling around, on their phones or talking quietly. 

 

“Tammy-” Michelle starts, her voice on the edge of pleading. 

 

“Michelle, it’s a school night. Go home.”

 

She packs up and Tammy gives her a hug and a kiss on the top of her head. Handing her a hot chocolate and sugar cookie. Smiling, Tammy tells her to be safe. 

 

Michelle decides to walk home, she only lives about a mile away. Her house keys can be turned into a blade and her shoes are tied tightly. She has learned how to live in New York, even if she hasn’t learned how to be a girl.

 

She’s only a block into walking when a black nice car pulls up beside her. Michelle takes out her pepper spray and puts her house keys in between in her fingers, in the back of her mind, Michelle wonders if it will always be like this.

 

Happy Hogan steps out of the car silently, looking the teenager up and down. Her hot chocolate in one hand and the other holding pepper spray and fingers turned into weapons. “C’mon kid, the boss wants to see you.”

 

Her parents are out of town right now, left that morning after dropping Michelle and Nicole off at school. Frankie is there now, watching them for the next week or so making sure they’ll be okay. Michelle called Frankie right after Cindy left, telling her that Michelle would be home late. Late, but safe. She promised.

 

Tony Stark is sitting in the back of the car, Happy tries to open the door for Michelle but she gave him a look and he backed off. 

 

“Michelle.”

 

“Stark.”

 

He laughs, it’s a hollow sound. 

 

“Are you kidnapping me or some shit?” Michelle asks, she tucks the pepper spray in her backpack pocket and sips on halfway cold hot chocolate. The house keys stay between her fingers. 

 

“ _ What? _ No. come on, kid. God no, I just wanted to talk,” Tony says. His voice is low and sounds sad. And it hurts Michelle, because she might be the cause of it. 

 

“Yeah, and following me around at night is really a  _ great  _ way to start a conversation.” Michelle looks at Happy who drives wordlessly, he takes the long way to her house. As if this whole thing is rehearsed. Tony chuckles, he sighs quietly.

 

They start talking at the same time. 

 

“You go first,” Tony says. And Michelle is oddly grateful.

 

“I’m sorry about you and Pepper Potts. I didn’t mean to do that,” Michelle says it quietly, aiming the words at the seat between her and Tony.

 

“It wasn’t your fault, kid.” 

 

Michelle looks up at him, his eyes are so earnest, so truthful, that Michelle looks away and squeezes her eyes tight.

 

“Peps and I were having troubles for some time, we both love each other. Michelle, look at me,” Tony says looking at Michelle seriously. “You didn’t do this.”

 

“Have you,” Michelle pauses, runs her hands over her backpack nervously. “Have you called her?”

 

“Pepper?”

 

“No,” they stop at a stop light, red lights shine on her tired face. “Beatrice.” 

 

Michelle sees Happy stiffen through the corner of her eye, the light turns from red to green. Michelle’s knees start to hurt. Growing pains.  _ Growing pains. _

 

“Not yet,” Tony looks away from Michelle and toward the front of the car, “it’s not the right time.” 

 

_ It’ll never be the right time. Not until someone turns their back on you like you’re a bullet and everything goes into flames. Not until you’re seconds away from death and you realize every mistake you’ve ever made and how  _ **_badly_ ** _ you wish you could go back in time. _

 

“I’m seeing you this fricking weekend, Stark. Why’d you pick me up, off the street at  _ night  _ no less,” Michelle exclaims. Anger boiling in her insides quickly, wrapping itself around her organs, squeezes out all the good until there is only pure anger left.

 

“I wanted to ask you about Peter,” Tony says. “He talks about you a lot. Whenever I have brunch with them, he always tells me and May about you.”

 

“May and  _ I _ ,” Michelle corrects. “Honestly, you’re supposed to be a genius. I’d hope to think you’d know proper grammar.” 

 

Tony laughs sarcastically, Michelle fakes a smile toward him. “Sorry, May and  _ I _ .”

 

“What do you wanna ask about Peter and I?” 

 

Tony cocks his head, curiosity stains his features. Michelle knows what he wants to ask, she knows. She always has. 

 

Here’s the thing about Michelle Jones and Peter Parker. There has always been something about them that has been inevitable. 

 

Michelle has known that since the summer between second and third grade when she was dragged to the park by Cole and Frankie and Frankie’s best friend who were babysitting Michelle and Cole. How Michelle spent most of the time reading poems from  _ Where The Sidewalk Ends _ , sitting at a picnic table under a tree. How Peter was there with Ben and May, and they invited her to play tag with them. She did, because Michelle was taught manners. How Cole and Frankie joined their game while Frankie’s friend bought them some food from a store a block away. Michelle has known how Peter Parker and her were always going to have  _ something,  _ since the first time she felt his hand in her own. 

 

Michelle grabbed his hand, pulling him up from the ground and  _ ran.  _ From that day on, she felt that pull between her and Peter. Michelle Jones and Peter Parker were inevitable, she didn’t know how to explain it very well. Michelle once tried to explain it to Cindy, but all the words became lava in her mouth and Michelle felt like she was telling some sort of long-held secret. Like she was opening Pandora’s Box. 

 

The things Michelle felt for Peter were sometimes like Pandora’s box, all this ugly. Their pasts, their present, everything that was out to hurt them. But like Pandora and her box, like night and day, like Michelle Jones and Peter Parker, it was  **_inevitable_ ** . 

 

(Michelle and Peter, everything that they had in common, everything that they didn’t, all of it was just another reason  _ why  _ they’re inevitable. The gods above had made a path and they were all waiting. Making bets, pooling their money and checking on Michelle and Peter in between making miracles happen and creating life. They were praying that Michelle and Peter would get together and stay together. Because they were meant to be. They always have been.)

 

“Michelle,” Tony cracks Michelle’s past in half and breaks through, talking to her. “I don’t want you to be hurt.” His voice is soft and fond as if he and Michelle had known each other for the longest time. The angry deflates in her chest, reminding herself,  _ this is for Peter.  _

 

_ This is for Peter. Not for your anger, or for your broken and beat past. Not for the bullet, or the Christmas story. This is for Peter Parker. Your inevitable someone.  _

 

“I don’t understand where you’re coming from, Stark.” Michelle talks like this is a meeting, like it’s not nine o’clock at night and Happy Hogan is driving her home, like she isn’t in the backseat of a car with someone who could buy her life and still have money leftover. Michelle Jones talks like this is nothing, when, in fact, it’s everything. Because it’s for Peter.

 

“Michelle, Peter cares about you. I see it in every word he says about you. And if you get hurt, even in the tiniest of bits, he won’t be able to live with himself,” Tony says, the car slows to a stop. Michelle faintly hears snow crunch under the tires.

 

Michelle puts her backpack on and tries to get out of the car without talking to Tony Stark anymore, but Tony grabs her wrist and looks at her earnestly. “Be careful, Michelle. I’m serious.” 

 

“You should call her,” Michelle says as a response. “Beatrice, I mean. It’ll never be the right time, and you might as well call her sooner rather than later. Because, you’re wasting time, Tony.”

 

He nods, Happy clears his throat quietly from the front seat of the car. Michelle shoots him a look through the rear view window. “Yeah, I’ll see you this weekend, Michelle.” 

 

Before Michelle gets out of the car, she looks back at Tony Stark in the backseat for a half second. His eyes are sad, caught in middle age loneliness and past trauma. Michelle turns around quickly. Even half a second is too long to be looking at the blueprint for a tragedy. 

 

Frankie and Cole are sitting in the kitchen making milkshakes when Michelle walks in, dropping her bag by the front door and leaning over to take off her combat boots. “Michelle? Come in here!” a voice calls out, Cole is so much like Frankie nowadays, it’s hard to tell who said it. 

 

“Should we put Kit Kats or M&M’s in milkshakes?” Frankie asks, Cole stands by the counter putting ice cream in the blender. Frankie looks so much younger now, no makeup on and wearing an old jersey with faded letters, glasses on the tip of her nose. She looks happier, better rested, less stressed. 

 

After the milkshakes, when Cole is showering, and Golden Girls is playing on the TV, Michelle asks the question that has been plaguing Michelle for a while now. 

 

“Frankie,” Michelle begins, playing with the buttons of the TV remote, “what do you do- what do you do when you feel like you and a person were just, like, meant to be?

 

“Michelle, do you like a  _ boy _ ?” Frankie teases, bumping her shoulder against Michelle’s. 

 

“You’re the worst,” Michelle groans, dragging herself to the floor. Frankie laughs loudly, looking at her niece halfway on the floor halfway on the couch. 

 

“Tell me about him,” Frankie requests and Michelle is grateful. She wants to tell, wants someone, anyone, to know.

 

“His name is Peter,” Michelle starts still on the floor, looking up at Frankie. “You met him a few weeks ago. He’s… good. He cares about other people and he’s smart. He doesn’t push me, and I’ve known him forever.”

 

Frankie looks at Michelle with a serious look. 

 

(listen, Frankie knows. Like  _ knows  _ knows. Francine Jones is a smart woman, she works hard and loves even harder. She cares about her family more than she cares about herself, and she  _ knows.  _ Frankie knows love when she sees it, she knows when two people belong with each other. And this, this is  _ it. _ )

 

“What do you feel for him, Em?” Frankie asks, her voice is light and careful. 

 

“I dunno,” Michelle states. “I feel like we’re supposed to happen. But I don’t know if he knows. He just,” Michelle spreads her fingers and clenches her fists. Fingernails digging into her palms, she finishes the sentence quietly. “He’s familiar. He always has been.”

 

Frankie pushes down a laugh and settles for a smile. “Focus on yourself before any relationship,” Frankie tells Michelle. 

 

“I know,” Michelle responds.

 

“Do you?”

 

Michelle doesn’t answer the question, and it’s not like Frankie expected an answer, anyway.

 

Michelle sleeps in the next day, even though it’s Friday and she still has school. When she wakes up, Cole and Frankie are sitting at the kitchen table, Frankie is reading a catalog and Cole is playing connect four. And it hurts, Michelle is reminded of Caleb. She tries to not think about it, but every time she blinks, he is there. Caleb appears everywhere, follows her like a dog. In the dusty corners of her mind and in the bottom of drawers, floating out of family photos on the fridge and sitting across the table from her when she eats breakfast. He’s everywhere, but the worst thing, the thing that makes Michelle want to destroy her Christmas story and everything with it; is the fact Caleb would love Peter. He really would, and it’s the worst thing in the world that her favorite person never got the chance to meet her inevitable someone.

 

“Hey, I called both of you in as sick. Your parents know, don’t worry. I just thought you needed a chill day,” Frankie tells Michelle without looking up from her catalog. Cole plays connect four by herself, concentrating on the pieces, trying to find the right way. Trying to connect all the pieces.

 

Michelle nods, grabs a fudge popsicle from the freezer and goes back to bed. Michelle lays on the foot of her bed until she finished the popsicle then finds her way under the comforter and goes back to bed.  _ Like she was trying to sleep away the past week. _

 

When Michelle wakes up the sun is setting and her body feels heavy, her clock reads five-thirty-six and her room is cold. The curtains are open, a stale cup of water by her bed, fingerprint stains on the side of it. She drinks it anyway, taking a sip and scrunching her nose in disgust. Falling back into her bed and ignoring the buzz of her phone, the way the light from the hallway shines from under her door, the way the sun gleams from over the buildings and making a faint pathetic glow into her bedroom. Michelle pulls herself out of bed, throwing her bare legs over the side and putting her feet onto the hardwood floor. Goosebumps race up her body, the house is freezing. Michelle looks at the floor, hands bracing themselves on her bed and toes curling. Her story is on pause, she just needs a break. An intermission. She’s alone. She needs someone to be there, someone that isn’t Peter or Cindy or her family. Someone that isn’t dead, she needs _ someone. _

 

There’s a knock at the door, Michelle whirls her head to it and sees Frankie’s head appears in the tiny crack of the door. “There’s someone here to see you, Michelle.”

 

Frankie smiles in a mellow manner then leaves, opening the door wider for the guest. Ned, of course, Ned, walks in. He has a back thrown over one of his shoulders and smiles slightly at Michelle. He looks tired, Michelle thinks.

 

“Hi, Michelle. Nice poster,” Ned says, pointing to a poster Michelle got at a black lives matter movement. Michelle hums in response, getting out of the bed and grabbing a flannel that was thrown over a chair. Putting it on and sitting on the chair she looks at Ned expectantly. 

 

“What’s up?” 

 

“He likes you, you know,” Ned says. Laughing breathlessly, “a lot. He calls you scary and intimidating, but that’s what he likes about you.”

 

“Ned,” Michelle began, “I don’t know if this is something we should be-” Michelle was cut off quickly. 

 

“Lots of people hate him, MJ. Lots. There’s someone after him right now, and you care about him. Or at least I think you do because he cares about you, we both do; but.” Ned trails off. Starts again quickly, “He wants you to be safe, MJ. I do too, and, and you should have the opportunity to turn away before you get hurt.”

 

Michelle is left with nothing but a few words. “I don’t want to run, Ned,” she whispers quietly, feeling like she's said this oh so many times. “I care about both of you, and if I’m in danger by being a friend, then so be it.”

 

Ned smiles and Michelle feels her Christmas dinner come out perfectly. Ned reminds Michelle of Liz, he’s kind in all the ways Liz was-  _ is.  _ In all the ways Michelle could never be kind. And he cares, Ned cares a lot. 

 

Before Ned leaves, Michelle walks him out because she was taught how to be  _ polite,  _ she calls out after him while he’s walking down the Jones’s walkway. 

 

“Ned!” Michelle calls out, watching as he turns around to see Michelle. A sharp gust of wind knocks her bare legs, Ned is unaffected. “You should ask Betty out,” Michelle smiles. “She’d say yes in a heartbeat.” Then Michelle shuts the door, feeling less alone than before.

 

“Frankie!” 

 

“What?” Frankie shouts out from Cole’s room, Michelle walks in and sees Frankie and Cole laying on Cole’s four poster bed watching YouTube on Frankie’s laptop. Cole looks up  aweary,  Frankie has her glasses on and is playing with Cole’s hair, they look like a Hallmark Christmas card.

 

“Can I go out this weekend with Peter? He knows Tony Stark and their going upstate,” Michelle asks, walking over to the bed and putting her hand on one of the posts. “Please?”

 

“Sure,” Frankie says, “but keep me updated on things that happen.” She winks after talking. Then, Frankie makes room for Michelle on the bed, forcing Cole to scoot over. “Watch BuzzFeed Unsolved with us, Shane is singing Mamma Mia.”

 

(The next morning, when Michelle wakes up in Cole’s bed alongside Cole and Frankie she will check her phone. In the groupchat she has with Cindy, Liz, Betty and herself there will be a message. 

 

_ Ned asked me out on a date.  _ Betty texts.

 

Later, Liz will reply,  _ took him long enough, jesus. you guys were some full on jim and pam type bullshit. finally!  _

 

Michelle will smile at her phone while eating Coco Puffs in front of the TV with Frankie and Cole.)

 

There’s a knock at the door, it’s Peter. Michelle knows this. She’s just finishing her breakfast. Cole answers the door, she nearly drops her phone when she sees who it is. Cole doesn’t even bother with a  _ hello  _ before calling out to Michelle, making their guest wait in the gold. 

 

“Michelle!” Cole calls out, looking into the living room where their tree is still up and then back to the man at the door. “Why the  _ fuck  _ is Tony Stark at our door?”

 

Frankie gets up before Michelle can, she’s at the door hitting Cole in the back of the head, “Nicole! Language!” Frankie hisses.

 

“Francine?” Tony asks, looking at Frankie with wonder. “How do you know Michelle?”

 

Cole cuts in before Frankie can answer, “Frankie, how do you know Stark?” 

 

Frankie shrugs, “he’s my boss.”

 

Michelle and Cole just gap at each other.  _ This,  _ they think.  _ Is Frankie’s secret job? _

 

“Since when?” Cole demands, still leaving Tony on the front steps. “A few years ago,” Frankie answers. The TV that’s still on in the living room plays loudly.

 

Coles rolls her eyes and mumbles something before walking into the kitchen. Frankie looks at Stark with an apologetic look before letting Tony inside. “Sorry about Cole,” Frankie excuses. Tony laughs as a response, “you act like you’re not like her.” 

 

“I take offense to that.”

 

“I’m sure you do,” Tony bites back. He turns to Michelle, “ready kid?”

 

Michelle nods, Cole comes out of the kitchen to say goodbye. Cole gives Michelle a fistbump before handing her a bracelet, “for good luck,” she says. Michelle puts it on quickly, she shares a smile with her sister. There is something in Cole’s eyes that makes Michelle spike with curiosity. 

 

“I love you,” Frankie says, pulling Michelle in for a hug. Rubbing Michelle’s back in fast smooth circles, a little of Michelle’s shirt bunches and rides up; exposing her skin to the cold. “Love you too.” 

 

Tony kisses Frankie’s cheek and smiles smoothly, they walk outside quickly. Feet crunching atop of snow and grass, the fresh smell of winter filling her senses. “Can we stop for coffee at the cafe near Midtown? I have money,” Michelle says, getting in the backseat of the car. Peter wasn’t there, she guessed they would pick him up next.

 

“Sure,” Tony says, “and I can pay. You’re a teenager.”

 

Michelle doesn’t fight him on that, she’s far too tired for that. 

 

When they walk in, Tammy greets them with a wide smile and looks at Michelle with suggestive eyebrows. “Usual?” Tammy asks, and Michelle smiles and nods. “And for you?” Tammy looks at Tony with a smile that isn’t completely fake.

 

“Black coffee, thank you.” Stark smiles and it’s charming, Michelle has seen interviews, has heard and read things. Michelle is well aware that Tony Stark is a charmer, it’s common knowledge by now. Michelle was told to stay away from people like Tony Stark, stay away from people who can catch the bullet in their mouth and smile around it. Who can put a hand on the small of your back and act like it’s innocent, who  _ know  _ how to work relationships like it’s their job. Michelle was told to stay away from people like that, and sure, she doesn’t see Tony as anything more than  _ Tony,  _ a billionaire who happens to dress up in an iron suit to save the world or whatever, but Tony is a charmer. And that worries Michelle more than she cares to admit. She isn’t sure  _ why _ .

 

“Comin’ right up,” Tammy responds with a smile, turning around and disappearing into the back room. 

 

“So,” Tony coughs, trying to fill the silence. “What are your plans after high school?” 

 

“I’m going to be a journalist, I’d like to go to Hamilton. But I gotta survive high school first,” Michelle says while sitting down a the counter.  _ Let It Be  _ starts playing over the speakers, it takes everything in Michelle not to hum along. 

 

“How about you,” Michelle narrows her eyes at Tony, “what are  _ your  _ plans?” 

 

He swallows roughly, darts his eyes away from Michelle. It’s nice, Michelle thinks, she has power. “I’m not sure yet, gotta save the world every other week y’know.”

 

“Sure,” Michelle cracks her neck and looks at Tony, “sure you do. There isn’t shit you  _ could  _ be doing, but you’re  _ avoiding.” _

 

Tony looks at the floor, like a child being yelled at. Like he’s guilty of something harmless. When he’s not, he’s wasting time, and that right there is a crime that can never be undone. 

 

Tammy comes out a few minutes later, handing them their coffees and two muffins, “one for your boy,” she says pointedly at Michelle with a bright smirk. Tony gives the same look to Michelle and Michelle says nothing back, instead walks out with her head held high, leaving Tony to pay by himself.

 

Michelle gets into the backseat of the car, resting her eyes and breathing in sharply. She drinks the coffee because she won’t let it go cold, she picks at her own muffin, getting crumbs under her nails. Happy looks at her in the mirror, his eyes are covered with sunglasses even though it’s gloomy outside. “Do you have any kids?” Michelle asks, looking at Tony who’s walking out of the coffee shop, a young girl in an Iron Man t-shirt runs up to him, smiling wide. Tony crouches down so he’s her height, the mother watches them protectively. 

 

“A daughter,” Happy says without looking at Michelle. “She’s ten next month.”

 

“What’s her name?”

 

“Virginia.” 

 

Tony opens the car door with a blast of cold air, his cheeks are flushed. The remains of a smile rest on his face. He sips on a coffee and holds Peter’s muffin. Happy starts the car on the way to Peter’s house. Michelle realizes they are going to drive on the street Caleb died on, most days Michelle can handle it, she really can. But today…

 

“Turn up here,” Michelle requests coming up to a stop light, pointing to a street that takes an alternate route to Peter and May’s house. 

 

“Why?” Happy asks at the stop light, obviously irritated. 

 

“Please?” Michelle pleads tiredly, Tony studies Michelle for a brief second before giving Happy a look. Happy sighs and turns on his blinker. 

 

Michelle drifts in and out of consciousness on the way to Peter’s house, leaning her head against the cold window, breath fogging the glass. She fully wakes up when they are on the way upstate, Tony sits in the across from Peter in the backseat while Happy drives in silence. Peter sits on the same seat with Michelle, her legs lay on his lap and he rubs her calf softly. Tony and Peter talk in distant voices, muffled by sleep and deja vu. Michelle doesn’t sit up, keeps her head laid on her arm and stares at the car floor. Peter and Tony don’t notice her, and if they do they don’t say anything about it. 

 

They get to the Stark towers and Michelle is woken up softly from her daze and reaches for her backpack only to realize Peter holds it in one hand while he wears his own. Michelle doesn’t fight for it back, but Tony wraps an arm around Peter, talking to him in a smothered voice. Michelle trails along behind them with Happy, she watches as Peter swings her backpack in his hand. She briefly wonders how much time went by, time has always been confusing for her. She cannot distinguish how much time goes by between events, how long she has slept or gazed at the wall. How she loses chunks of time, how everything just ebbs and flows together. Sure, good moments and memories have happened so have bad ones, and she remembers them, knows the pain like she knows the lyrics to her favorite song, but she doesn’t know the dates they happened on. Plus, there is so much time between the things that she can hold onto, so many months and days of watching the clock tick, that it’s hard to realize when things have actually happened. That it’s hard to know how much time has gone by since the last time she ate or slept or talked to someone that didn’t live in her house. 

 

“C’mon,” Tony says. “I’ll show you where you’ll be sleeping,” he tells Michelle. Peter has already roamed away from them and down a hallway, and it’s scary. How quiet he can be, how he can appear from room to room. How loud he can be at school, yelling with Ned about video games or Star Wars. but  _ now,  _ he is trained to be quiet. Michelle wonders what his weakness is, what could cause him to crack and break under a villains fingertips. It’s a disturbing thought to think, Michelle knows this.

 

Tony opens a door to a plush bed with sheets at the foot of it and a wall TV. The view is nice, Michelle wanders in running her hands over the unmade bed. Tony sets her bag down on the floor next to the bed, she feels like this is some sort of fucked up hotel. 

 

“C’mon kid, Peter and I can show you the lab.” Tony stands in the doorway waiting for Michelle, he looks older, somehow. More tired. Like his age and stress is finally catching up with him.

 

Peter meets them in a huge main room that has a window that views a large grassy field, Michelle knows to send a photo of it to Cindy later. Tony disappears into a doorway Michelle didn’t realize was there when his phone rings, he tells them that he’ll be right back. To wait there. And to not touch anything that looks breakable, he gives Peter a look and Peter’s neck flushes. 

 

“I thought you hated me,” Peter says suddenly, falling over the arm of a couch and looking over at Michelle. “You acted like you hated me, or everyone. But mostly me.”

 

Michelle ponders that for a second before sitting on  _ another  _ couch near Peter. “I don’t think I could hate you, Pete.”

 

She adds the Pete to make this seem casual, when it’s not. Nothing with Peter is casual. Michelle doesn’t have casual,  _ Pete  _ feelings for him. Michelle’s feelings for Peter are her Christmas lights burning brighter and the tree collapsing whenever he looks her way. Are the dinner burning before it even gets in the motherfucking oven, are flushed cheeks and not from the cold. Are craving his skin brushed up against his. Michelle’s feelings for Peter are a scream into the void and bones rotten like old fruits. Flies swarming around the moldy apples and her doubts swarming around her feelings. She is  _ doomed.  _ Because on the off chance that Peter does, in fact, having the same feelings for her back, it cannot go anywhere. Michelle has scars from grief and lonely nights with even lonelier thoughts. Has pills rattling in her backpack and a never-ending rattle in her screwed up head. Michelle Jones and Peter Parker have been fucked since birth, the worst part is, that destiny had decided one night that Peter and Michelle might’ve been meant to be. Like some tragedy story waiting to be finished, a game show for the gods to watch and makes bets on.

 

“MJ,” Peter starts quietly, reaching his hand out an uncomfortable length to reach her own. “I wish you would let go for one second and tell me how you really feel.”

 

Everything goes dark in her head, for a few half seconds. Then it’s brighter than it ever has been. Michelle wonders if Peter can see the shine in her eyes. 

 

“I-” Michelle cuts herself off, shutting her eyes and rolling her neck. “It’s hard to explain.” Michelle deflates, wanting to pull her hand away from his like it’s burning her. Peter holds on tighter, his skin is clammy and it’s strangely endearing. 

 

“I think I could understand.” Peter pulls Michelle out fo her seat and over to him in a clumsy manner. He doesn’t struggle, he doesn’t use more than minimal effort to move her.

 

Michelle laughs, chokes on it, sits next to Peter. “You really couldn’t.”

 

“Try me,” Peter whispers, smelling like cinnamon and home. 

 

“It’s like,” Michelle breathes and smiles in a pained way. “We’ve always- always sorta been inevitable. There’s always been a string.”

 

Peter doesn’t say anything, he does not smile or laugh, his eyebrows furrow and he brings his fingers to her chin and run a smooth fingertip over her jawline. She leans into the touch like a cat being pet, eyes flutter like butterflies and something in the back of her head purrs. 

 

“But… we’re ephemeral. We’re broken.” Michelle lays a hand on his neck, cold fingertips and he shivers. “I think the world has other plans for us.”

 

Peter shakes his head softly, he says, “I don’t think so.” 

 

And they’re  _ close. _ Head tilted and eyes shutting and opening softly. Almost like their souls are away from their bodies and watching from above. It’s easy to act cool and reversed at school, out in public. But Peter took an ax and destroyed the house inside her head. Ripped down the walls she had painted a multitude of different colors, one for each feeling she had ever felt. He didn’t act like she was a damsel, or a prize, or something to be saved. He acted like she was a person, a living breathing person with goals and ideas and something besides happiness in her heart. Peter had been an ever-growing presence in her life and it wasn’t something she planned for. It wasn’t something she knew how to cope with.

 

“I didn’t plan for this,” Peter says, lips nearly brushing her own. “It all happened so fast.  _ You  _ happened so fast.” 

 

Michelle swallows and blinks back tears, “I’m sorry,” she says wetly.

 

Peter shakes his head, “no. god, don’t be sorry. You have nothing to be sorry for anything, ever.”

 

It feels like this might be the start of something, something new and fresh and  _ so completely them.  _ But Tony fucking Stark walks back in and the illusion is ruined. Michelle jumps away from him in a half second and colors her face in bone-chilling coldness. Tony is still on the phone and he isn’t looking at them, not yet, so Michelle steals a glance at Peter.

 

He’s already looking at her like she hung the moon. They’re inevitable. And Michelle realizes she’s completely and utterly  _ fucked.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alsooo, sorry i didn't update sooner. there was a death in my family so i missed some school and such and that hit me hard. plus it's been freezing where i live so getting myself out of bed to write has been hard. i'm so sorry if the next chapter, that will be very long because we might be coming up on the end, is not posted this week. i'll be very busy but i'll try to find time to write. I do hope you enjoy this chapter, i worked super duper hard on it! 
> 
> ( if you guys left comments or kudos it would warm my heart. i love reading them. <33 )


	9. FOREVER IS A WORD THAT CRIES

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> few notes about this chapter  
> one - civil war ended better. this is an AU so I can do what I want. Nat, Steve and such all live upstate with Tony.  
> two - time might be a little trippy? if you have any questions about it, comment and I'll try to answer clearly.  
> three - the book that is mentioned is On Love by Alain de Botton, I highly recommend it.  
> four - in 1997 Tony Stark was apparently 27 years old, so that will clear up a few things about this in the chapter.
> 
> hope you all enjoy!

Michelle and Peter end up sitting in one of the living rooms, scrolling through Netflix. Peter has the remote, Tony in the background ordering food, Michelle and Peter sitting on the couch, her legs lay in his hap while her head leans on the armrest. It’s very similar to when she spent the night at Peter’s, only the TV is bigger and it was right after Michelle fell asleep; almost swiftly falling to the floor. _Now,_ well, they’re just taking a break. They spent time in the lab, in other rooms of the tower, Tony let Michelle borrow a few books from his personal library. They were sitting on the floor next to the couch, she would bring them to her own room later. Peter pauses every once and a while, reading the descriptions of the movies or shows, mouth moving while he read. Michelle watched him quietly, observing his movements. The way he purses his lips, how his eyes dart across the TV, how his head tilts and his fingers on the remote glaze over all the buttons before settling on one.

 

Peter looks over at Michelle and smiles. It’s a soft, intimate thing. She feels blood rush to her face and ducks her head away. Peter pats her leg softly, he leaves his hand near the base of her ankle. It’s a welcome warmth. They settle on watching Schitt’s Creek, Michelle rolling over a bit more to get more comfortable. Tony walks in a few minutes into the fourth episode, putting his phone in his back pockets. “Food will be here soon.”

 

“What’d you get?” Peter asks while Tony sits on one of the other many pieces of furniture in the large room. Michelle wonders what took him so long to

 

“Pizza,” Tony says while looking at the TV. He looks tired but relieved. Like he did something that he needed to do for a while.

 

Michelle pulls her legs from Peter’s lap and asks where the kitchen is, water, she says. When it’s not water that she wants. She just would like to know what Tony’s home looks like. Tony points her down a hallway and tells her to go to the right, “if you hit a gym you’ve gone too far.”

 

The kitchen is dim, has one of the lights that you can control how bright it can get. Michelle spends a few seconds too long playing with it before she sets it at dim, soft light. She wanders around the kitchen in her socked feet, eyes straying on each and everything inside of it.

 

There is a photo of Pepper Potts and Tony on the fridge. It’s held up with an orange pumpkin magnet, slightly crooked like the rest of the photos and papers on the large black fridge.

 

The photo is… nice.

 

The assumed love looks posed, fake. They’re smiling at the camera, but Tony looks tired and the hand on Pepper’s shoulder looks misplaced. _Pepper_ , well she looks, she looks stiff. Uncomfortable. Not like she hates Tony but hates the fact that someone is documenting her and Tony. Michelle feels bad for Pepper, some things don’t last if others know about it. Michelle guesses that might’ve been what happened in their relationship. But she doesn’t know, she doesn’t know at all.  

 

She takes too long getting the water and someone walks in, the footsteps are quiet until they’re loud and Michelle whirls around to see who is standing behind her.

 

It’s Peter, his head is cocked to one side and his lips are parted. “What’d you doing?”

 

Michelle shrugs, eyes straying to the floor. Peter moves closer, Michelle watched his feet moved next to hers. His arms move around her and he breathes next to her ear, Michelle leans into his touch. She always does, because it’s _Peter._ He’s Peter, he’s inevitable. He’s strong and hasn’t left Michelle yet.

 

“You’ve been in here for a while,” Peter tells Michelle, one hand stays a stable grip on her waist while the other goes up to touch her neck. His bare skin to hers. This isn’t like how she is used to being touched. His hands are cold, she can feel him playing with baby hairs on her neck. The ones she sometimes cuts with small thread scissors. His thumb rubs her neck, in slow circles.

 

Her shaking hands almost move up to him, moving from hanging limply at her sides to Peter’s arms. But footsteps ring down the hallway, and she backs out of his grasp quickly. Going to the fridge grabbing a bottled water. She grabs one for Peter and turns back toward him, he stands stunned. “Think fast,” Michelle says. Throwing the bottle at him. He catches it, of course.

 

Peter slips out past Tony, who walked in and gave Michelle a look. “Did I ruin something,” he said like he was accusing her of something. Michelle says nothing in return, just walks out with her head held high.

 

They eat dinner in front of the TV. Tony walks out of the room when his phone rings, not saying anything into the phone until he’s out of ears range. Michelle smiles, hoping he’s calling who she wants him to call. Peter notices and gives her a confused look. “What?”

 

Michelle takes a drink of her water, “Beatrice.”

 

“Beatrice?”

 

Michelle nods, “well,” she says. “I don’t know if it’s Beatrice. But I hope it is.”

 

Peter still looks lost, but he says nothing else. Just eats and watches the TV with a blank expression.

 

Tony walks in later, sits down and watches the show with them. His hair is messier and he looks worn down. But he has the faint remains of a smile on his face, a secret that no one else should know. Michelle grins and Peter hands her the last piece of Hawaiian pizza.

 

They go to bed in separate rooms, Peter’s is down the hallway. Michelle sees it before she goes to bed, his room is much bigger than hers. And looks like something Peter would live in, on a fireplace (a fucking _fireplace_ ) there were flowers. Sunflowers. Pretty and somehow not dead or wilted at all, Michelle walks over and touches the petals of one.

 

“Sunflowers?” Michelle asks, looking over at Peter who is looking a dresser

 

“They’re nice,” Peter shrugs. Taking out a pair of sweatpants from the drawer. Michelle hums and goes to her own room, wishing Peter to sleep well.

 

Michelle stops when she hears Tony’s voice, smooth and low. Talking into a phone in the kitchen, a hand running through his hair stressfully. Michelle looks at him from behind the corner, watching his eyes dart around from under closed lids and mouth move quietly, saying things too low for Michelle to hear.

 

He hangs up sometime later, Michelle sat listening. In a dazed like state, face blank, and mind fuzzy with lack of sleep and movement. Michelle snaps out of it and walks over to Tony, “was it her?”

 

Tony looks away bashfully, like a schoolboy with a crush. “Why are you so keen on knowing?”

 

“Some people,” Michelle says sitting down on one of the stools, “deserve a happy ending.”

 

Tony shifts uncomfortably. Hands curling into fists, biting the inside of his cheek.

 

“And you’re one of them. You deserve your happy ending, Stark.”

 

Tony looks her in the eye, something like a smile twitched at his lips. His hands shook slightly at his sides and his neck had a very slight blush. “It was her. Beatrice, she’s in town. Ironic, right? We never had the right timing until now…”

 

Michelle tilts her head and gives Tony a muddled face. “Life has a funny way of doing things.”

 

“Michelle,” Tony calls when Michelle starts to walk out. His voice has a slight tremble in it. “She would like to meet you, told her about you. She says you’re bright. Says you’re _good_.”

 

Michelle turns around and nods, before making her way into her own room. The cool sheets, the paintings, and clean bedframe. The room didn’t look lived in. Looked like someone had it made right before she walked in. Michelle opened the curtains to a night sky, turned on the TV to a cartoon show. Took out her charger and plugged in her phone, found extra blankets in the closet and threw them on the bed. Trying to make the room feel more alive.

 

Michelle doesn’t fall asleep, she can hear everything. The sound of the bed squeaking, the TV being slightly static, her feet rubbing against each other. Wind snapping at the window, her hair against the pillow. Everything is too loud and too dead.

 

She throws the blanket off of herself and grabs her phone with shaky hands. Wanders out of her room into the illuminated hallway, and peers around. Looking to see if there is anyone else.

 

Her feet do not echo, her body is quiet and careful. Michelle knocks on his door before opening it, seeing Peter Parker still awake and scrolling through something on his phone. He turns it off when he sees her, sits up and gets out of bed. “What’s wrong?” He asks, voice impossibly soft.

 

“It’s,” she pauses frustrated. “It’s loud, in my room.”

 

She doesn’t say anything else. And Peter understands what she is trying to say.

 

“You can sleep in here, if you want.” Peter doesn’t speak loudly, it’s soft against the loudness of Michelle’s mind. It’s every cliche ever, sharing the bed. The loneliness being filled by the presence of other people. The sexual overlaying undertone of it. But Michelle doesn’t want it to be sexual, she doesn’t want that. She just…

 

She wants someone to be there. To ground her. To open the presents with her and to decorate the tree. Just to be _there._

 

“Okay,” Michelle whispers softly. “Okay.”

 

Michelle lays down next to him, facing toward him. She brings her hand up, and softly. Attentively, caringly, tenderly, like Peter is a fragile thing. Michelle Jones brings her hand up and lays a hand flat on his chest. He’s firm, there. Alive and warm. Warmer than she expected, warmer than any human she has ever held or touched or seen. He’s quiet, he doesn’t say anything to Michelle. Just closes his eyes and relaxes.

 

Michelle doesn’t move her hand much, just touches Peter with a hand laid on his chest. She can feel his heartbeat, the steady rise of his breathing, his human-ness. Michelle feels more than she has felt in a long time.

 

“MJ…”

 

Michelle doesn't answer, closes her eyes and rests her head safely against the pillow.

 

“MJ, please.”

 

“Don’t,” Michelle tells him. “Just don’t.”

 

And he doesn’t. He doesn’t push. He doesn't make her talk. He lets Michelle sleep. Peter Parker lets Michelle sleep because she needs it. Because this isn’t something that happens. Because he loves her. Because it’s so complicated as a whole but when he breaks it down, it’s so simple. It’s so easy to see. Peter Parker has always been halfway in love with Michelle Jones since he watched her yell and scream and kick when Flash’s older brother tried to pick her up off the ground and throw Michelle over his shoulder. Since he watched her sing in a solo she had in an elementary school concert. Since he saw her hug May during Ben’s funeral.

 

Peter Parker has been halfway in love with Michelle Jones. Even when he had a crush on Harry Osborn, a boy who went to his middle school and moved to Germany right after eighth grade ended. Even when he made out awkwardly with a girl in freshman year at a party. Even when he went to homecoming with Liz Allan and put her dad in jail. And now, with Michelle laying next to him. Asleep and empty. They both are fucked up. Both have a tragic sob story. Both know death like an old friend and treat abandonment like the person that lives next door to you. Peter is in love with Michelle, and he’ll never be able to explain why. Or how. Or when it happened.

 

All Peter knows is that it did, one day Michelle shifted in his eyes. And he hopes he shifted in her eyes too.

 

Michelle wakes up alone, the other side of the bed is still warm. Her eyes are heavy with sleep and her body is heavy with loneliness. Michelle throws herself out of bed, feet touching the soft carpet floor. The room smells like spring and good choices, like new beginnings.

 

Peter walks in the room a few seconds later, in gym shorts with a shirt sticking to his skin. He’s sweaty and has headphones in, not realizing that Michelle is awake. Walking right past her. Michelle pushes down the feeling of abandonment and watches Peter move. He doesn’t have much grace, but Michelle has known this for a while. He grabs a shirt out from a drawer and a few other things, boxers, joggers, socks and a necklace. Michelle watches the muscles move in his back, his hands tap on the hardwood of the dresser, his feet stumble over each other. She just watches, remembering and locking it into a safe of her memory.

 

Peter turns around and catches Michelle watching, she looks away timidly, wishing she could melt into the floor. When she looks back up a few seconds later, his headphones are out and he’s smiling at Michelle.

 

“I’m gonna take a shower,” he tells Michelle kindly. “There’s breakfast in the kitchen. I’ll be there to eat with you soon.”

 

Michelle nods and starts to walk out of the room, goosebumps run up her arms. She shivers, something hits her back. “Here,” Peter says to her. “Wear that, it’s clean.”

 

It’s his jacket, the blue and gray one with soft fabric. She puts it on and turns around to thank Peter.

 

But he’s already in the bathroom and she can hear the water running.

 

Michelle makes her way into the into the kitchen and sees a woman standing with her back to Michelle. She looms by a coffee pot, her red hair is back into a neat ballet-style bun and each and every one of her movements has a poise that everyone Michelle has met lacks. Michelle tries to be quiet when she reaches for the pitcher of orange juice and a glass cup already on the counter. But apparently, she isn’t quiet enough because the woman spins around and looks at Michelle.

 

She eyes Michelle with curiosity, taking a sip from her coffee and leaning against the counter. She smirks at Michelle, then speaks.

 

“You’re Michelle Jones.” It’s not a question, nor an introduction, just a fact.

 

“I am,” Michelle answers. Trying to make her voice sound smooth. “And you are?”

 

The woman laughs, “a million dollar question, really,” she says. “But you can call me Nat.”

 

Michelle nods, drinking her orange juice and grabbing a plate from a stack. Piling a few pancakes and putting peanut butter on them, she tries to ignore Nat’s intense stare.

 

“Put powdered sugar on it too,” Nat says. “It tastes good.”

 

Michelle does that, and it tastes good. Nat sits next to her at the counter, eating her own breakfast. “You’re friends with the kid, right?”

 

Michelle nods.

 

“You told Stark to call Beatrice, right?”

 

Michelle nods.

 

“You’re a smart kid,” Nat says. “And you’re pretty. You need to protect yourself.”

 

Michelle nods. She wants to talk but all the words turn to dust before she can say anything. Nat doesn’t seem to mind, she doesn’t seem to mind Michelle being a little scared of her.

 

“I’ll teach you how,” Nat tells Michelle. “I’ll teach you how. Just come around more often, and I will.”

 

“I’d like that,” Michelle says. Sure, she knows how to make a fist. Carries pepper spray with her and can turn her housekeys into blades, but _learning._ “I’ll make sure to come around more.”

 

They eat breakfast quietly from then until Peter walks in and lays a soft hand on Michelle’s lower back to alert his presence. Nat doesn’t look up at Peter, but while he’s grabbing something from the fridge, she throws a crumpled napkin at him. Michelle stiffens her own laugh, hiding in her food. Peter throws them a look, but Michelle isn’t sure because her head is down and Nat might be smiling next to her. But again, Michelle cannot tell.

 

Peter sits in front of them, eating and putting maple syrup on his pancakes. He also puts chocolate chips on them, Michelle scrunches her nose in disgust. Peter doesn’t notice, but Nat does. And she rolls her eyes.

 

They finish breakfast with light conversation, Michelle squints at the fridge and realizes that the photo of Pepper and Tony no longer hangs on it. Michelle can’t help but be a little proud about that. Nat notices her staring and nods to Michelle as a secret, it’s nice. It really, really is.

 

Nat goes somewhere after breakfast but touches Michelle’s forearm and looks at her with a flash of melancholia. Flash of wonder. Flash of war. She tells Michelle to ask Tony for her number, that they can get together and train someday.

 

Peter shows her around the place. It’s pleasant, neat. The hallways are long and normally have large windows at the end of them, near a staircase that goes up or down. He shows her gyms, small ones and the big one that everyone uses. He shows her the lab and they talk to Tony for a little bit before walking to look around more. Peter tells Michelle that everyone has their own floor, beside him, and they almost never eat breakfast with each other but they train together.

 

Peter tells her about Steve Rogers, about the star-spangled man and how sometimes when Peter is spending the night, he’ll find Steve looking through old newspapers trying to catch up to the world he missed out on.

 

He tells her about Bucky Barnes and how Peter stopped a punch with his hand against the metal arm, he tells Michelle about how Bucky was brainwashed and sometimes forgets who he is. Or how Peter will find Bucky and Steve watching reality TV shows and finding every single person on _Survivor_ stupid. Or how sometimes Peter will hear distant screaming when he’s trying to sleep then he’ll hear loud footsteps and the next morning when he goes to train, Bucky will have been there for hours.

 

Peter says that Doctor Banner is amazing, that he and Peter do nerdy shit a lot and Michelle smiles at that. He tells Michelle about how Banner sometimes will sleep for nearly two days straight after de-hulking and Michelle feels bad about that. Because, she thinks, none of these people, these heroes, chose to live this life. They just played with the cards they were dealt.

 

Peter stops talking about the other Avengers when they reach a large double door, he opens it and it’s a library. A big one. Michelle smiles at Peter then gets lost in her own world, Peter apparently leaves for a while, to get lunch. But Michelle doesn’t notice, she just reads and runs her fingers over spines of old books and new books. Someone leaves a plate of pasta on the table next to Michelle, but she doesn’t finish it. She finds books here and there that have handwriting in them, some of it is neat, some messy. Some of it is in English, some not. Peter doesn’t come back inside, and Michelle notices. Because he was supposed to be there, she was slowly forming a stack of books he might like. But then, he’s not there.

 

Someone walks in, and Michelle looks up hoping it’s Peter. But it’s not.

 

(For a second, she thinks it’s Caleb. It’s not that the person looks like him, or has the same mannerisms as him. But sometimes, sometimes Michelle finds Caleb in the spaces between words or the dust atop picture frames. In the clouds or in her shaking hands that reach for another book. In the bullet of the gun or the broken star, in the exploding lights or ashy Christmas tree. Caleb is in the words of The Girls and in Mrs. Flores’ eyes. Michelle is pissed, because she’s supposed to be over this goddamn it. She is supposed to be over Caleb, supposed to be done mourning him. When she’s not.

 

Sometimes, when Michelle is on the verge of burning down the whole fucking house with her in it, she writes Caleb’s name on walls and in journals. On the back of her wrist and in the mirror with toothpaste. She always leaves out the e. _I am not finished with you yet,_ Michelle thinks as she furiously writes his name. Over and over and over again. _I am not finished with you yet._ )

 

The person is just Tony, he looks tired. Looks tired but happier than normal. Like someone turned on a light in his body and now his eyes have a gleam and his mouth twitches at a smirk.

 

“There’s no school for you tomorrow,” he says. “Snow day.”

 

Michelle nods, wringing her hands and breathing softly. “Beatrice is coming tonight.” His voice is soft and has something similar to fear in it. “You’ll be able to meet her.”

 

Michelle smiles, genuinely smiles. “That’s really great, Tony. I’m happy for you.”

 

“Maybe,” Tony starts, moving closer to Michelle and looking at the books she has piled up. “You should tell Peter.”

 

“That Beatrice is coming?”

 

“No.” Tony shakes his head, grabbing a book out from the shelf near them. “Tell him how you feel.”

 

“That’s not your place to be, Stark,” Michelle seethes.

 

“And it wasn’t your place to tell me to call Beatrice,” Tony snaps back. “But you were there, and now I am here. You should tell him.”

 

Tony then walks out, throwing a book at Michelle. Michelle catches it because she won’t let a book get broken so easily before she reads the title, Tony calls out. “Peter will be back up here soon.” When Tony leaves, Michelle flips the book over to read the cover.

 

**_On Love, Novel by Alain de Botton._ **

 

As Michelle opened the book, a picture slipped out, old and dusty. The photo was of, who Michelle assumed, was a young Tony Stark. Fine features, slightly glassy, but smooth. Round glasses and smiling, floppy hair, standing next to a girl. Looking at her as if she created life.

 

The girl was beautiful. Gorgeous. She was laughing in the photo, a wide smile painted on her face, one hand holding onto Tony’s and the other near her face. She was wearing a jacket that was too big for her, and a dress that was a burgundy color. She was beautiful. Stunning. She looks like a 1940s movie star, like Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca but with darker skin. Like she was born to be seen, her beauty was alluring.

 

And Michelle didn’t like that, that she only knew she was beautiful. It felt superficial but _goddamn_. How can you _not_ look at her and think she’s heavenly.

 

She flips the photo over and scribbled out in neat and all capital letters, is two names, a date, and a quote.

 

_Tony Stark & Beatrice Valentine _

_1997_

_“_ _The most attractive are not those who allow us to kiss them at once (we soon feel ungrateful) or those who never allow us to kiss them (we soon forget them), but those who know how to carefully administer varied doses of hope and despair.”_

 

Beatrice Valentine. Long name. Michelle puts the photo back into the book and puts the book in the middle of the stack she is going to read. When she sits on one of the large, comfortable chairs near the windows, she opens one book she found, but can’t get into it. With shaking hands, she reaches for On Love, opening it, there is underlined phrases and writing in the book. All with the same handwriting from the back of the photo. Michelle gets sucked into a world, not the one in the book, but the one with Tony and Beatrice. The one where they didn’t waste time. Where they didn’t lose decades of time.

 

From far away, back in the present, not in the 90s where Michelle was, watching Beatrice and Tony be in love from the notes in the margins, someone calls her name from behind her.

 

“Michelle,” they call. It’s not Peter’s voice, he only calls her MJ now. It’s a man's voice, she knows. And when Michelle feels a hand touch her shoulder, she jumps out of her own skin and disappears into a Christmas village. Watching from a porcelain house with a small yellow lightbulb inside as a tall blonde man give herself a worried look. Michelle is back in her own skin as she realizes who he was.

 

Steve Rogers is prettier in person, he looks like the star of a romantic comedy. But no, he is the star of a war.

 

“You’re really pretty,” Michelle says. It’s not flirting, it’s just truth. Steve looks taken aback, a red blush builds at the bottom of his neck. But he smiles otherwise and chuckles slightly.

 

“Thank you,” he says. “Dinner is ready. Peter was sparring with Nat, I was told to get Michelle from the library. I assume you’re Michelle?”

 

“Yeah.” Michelle sets the book down on the chair and stands up to Steve. “What’s for dinner?”

 

“They got a bunch of bread and ingredients to make your own sub,” Steve tells Michelle as they walk across the library. He opens the door for her, and Michelle might’ve snapped at him but he’s Steve Rogers and he’s a gentleman. He’s a good person.

 

(Steve Rogers sort of reminds Michelle of Caleb, they’re both good people to faults. Both had nice hair and were taller than her. Both treated life like a gift, like it there was a reason for it. Steve reminded Michelle of Caleb.

 

It sorta makes Michelle’s opinion of Steve downgrades a little. Michelle feels bad about it, it’s not Steve’s fault that he acts like a fraction like her dead cousin. It’s not Steve’s fault, he’s a hundred years old and her cousin died a few years ago. When Steve was out saving the world or some shit while her cousin was dying because Michelle had her first period.

 

Fuck being a girl sometimes, honestly. Girls can kill a man without meaning to. Ugh.)

 

“How do you know Peter?” Steve asks, they go to the steps, even though the elevator would be faster.

 

“We grew up together,” Michelle says. “We’ve gone to the same school since I can remember.”

 

Steve doesn’t say anything else. They walk in silence until they get to the dining room. He opens the door for them. Michelle walks in and goes to find Peter. But a knock at the door stops her.

 

Michelle freezes when someone knocks at the door, nobody else notices, no one looks over or appears next to her. They’re all in the kitchen or living room. Peter isn’t next to her like he said he would be, and Michelle is alone. The door feels eerie, like something from a Stephen King novel. Something from the start of a bad horror movie, from the first kill. The scream, the opening title. The nightmare sequence.

 

Michelle steps over to the door, her hands hanging at her sides. Her eyes are scanning the room, trying to find something, _anything._ When she won’t find anything. Michelle knows she won’t, it’s a door. Not a fucking window.

 

Her hand reaches for the door, placing her hand on the doorknob. She spins the knob and opens the door, cold hair blasts her face.

 

It’s Caleb, he’s there. Blood leaks from his eyes and mouth gapes open unhumanly. His skin peels at the edges and is slightly transparent. He reaches an ashy arm to Michelle, long and unmoving, unnatural.

 

Michelle stands in front of him, her cousin, the dead, frozen. His shriek echoes throughout Michelle’s ears. Michelle covers her ears, yells, screaming for someone to come and help.

 

It’s Peter who walks in. He looks at Michelle, screaming at the empty doorway. Hands covering her ears and face paling quickly. Eyes glassed over as she stares into the snow. Peter shuts the door and lays his hands on Michelle’s shoulders.

 

“MJ,” he says. “MJ, wake up. It’s not real. MJ, come on.”

 

Michelle stops yelling, her hands fall to her sides. But her eyes stay blurry and staring at dark doorway. “MJ, wake up.”

 

Her eyes shut and flash open quickly. Like she saw something she never wanted to see again. “Peter?”

 

(At first it was Caleb, then it was Ben. Then it was a world where they were alive and everything was okay. Then their deaths played on a loop, then there was screaming. Loud and unflattering. Then Michelle was in the sky and was watching herself cry and yell. Then Peter was throwing something at a wall and watching it shatter. Then Mrs. Flores was walking inside her Victorian house with the pastor in the driveway and her mother was Caleb saying that she should’ve turned her back. Then it was star dying and Cole smiling at her in the mirror. Then drunk driver was throwing back a shot. Then Tony was smiling at Beatrice and someone was taking the photo. Then Liz was leaving and Michelle was having panic attacks in the bathroom after the school dance. Then Frankie was holding the steering wheel too tight and her parents were holding hands in the car. Then she was sitting at the bottom of the stairs on the phone with Peter. Then she was in the car with Tony. Then Tammy was smiling at her and then Cindy was in the hospital bed, and Peter was standing next to her and everything was in flames. Then, then, then-

 

It was all on fire.

 

And Michelle could do nothing to stop it.)

 

“MJ, breathe. Breathe.”

 

Michelle leans into Peter and hides. She needs to rest. She needs to sleep. She needs to fly far, far away.

 

Someone knocks on the door, for real this time, because Peter notices it. Tony walks in and looks at Michelle, who is crumbled into Peter’s arms and Peter who rubs her back and whispers to her.

 

( _God,_ Tony thinks. _The kid is so gone for her_.)

 

Michelle pulls back when Tony gets within a few feet of them, someone knocks at the door again. She opens it because she wants too. Because she knows who it is. Because it’s not Caleb, or Ben or anyone in the nightmare.

 

She is even more beautiful in person.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all, I'm sorry. life hit me with a bunch of bricks and I was forced to deal with it in a short time. I haven't had time to write and when I do it's very difficult. but I'm going to get through it. I'm not giving up on this story. this chapter was a hot mess and the ones to come will be better, I promise. this is by far, my least favorite update. I'm sorry if it's yours too. but it'll get better.
> 
> thank you for reading, I do hope you enjoyed this chapter. <33


	10. NORTH, SOUTH, EAST, AND WEST

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i like this chapter! also this hints at scarletwidow, which will probs be more developed in later chapters because that ship is cute. this has some fluff because i felt like y'all needed it. movie night with Avengers, Michelle not knowing half their names and cute shit with Tony and Beatrice. the chapter name is a reference to a quote by W. H. Auden. another thing, Nat and Michelle would be bff's. don't even disagree. i hope you all enjoy this chapter!

 

Michelle has a dream.

 

The Christmas movie is over, she is no longer the star of a fucked up life. She walks into an apartment after work. There are candles lit that smell like fall, there are flowers on the windowsill and she has her own desk. Her comforter is a pretty green and the bed is made. The walls are soft yellows and whites, blues and lilac. She comes home to someone, they ask her how her day was and she tells them about writing. About the news, about journalism, about her day. Music plays from a radio in the background and the sun shines through the windows with curtains that match the couch. They hold her hand over the dining room table and each touch radiates of love. Of warmth. 

 

The winter is finally over, and spring starts. 

 

Everything turns out okay.

 

“You must be Beatrice,” Michelle smiles. Peter stands a few feet behind her, and Tony stands next to Peter. 

 

Beatrice has aged, of course, she has. Everyone does. But Michelle can still see the girl in the photo from 1997 in her eyes. She wears a trench coat that’s a muffled pink, and lace-up heeled boots. Cherry red winter gloves, with a matching hat. She has a darkly colored purse hanging from one hand. She smiles at Michelle softly.

 

“I am,” Beatrice says, reaching her gloved hand out for Michelle to shake. “And you’re Michelle Jones, aren’t you?”

 

Michelle smiles wider, this woman knows her name. Knows who she is. “I am, it’s nice to meet you.”

 

Peter appears next to Michelle and lays a warm hand on her back, reaching his other one to shake Beatrice’s.

 

There is chatter a room over, Michelle looks behind her shoulder at Tony, who seems in a slight trance. Beatrice looks up at Tony, her smile is fond and welcoming. Michelle steps out of her way and pulls Peter with her as Beatrice steps inside. Peter tries pulling Michelle away, but she resists. She wants to watch this, wants to watch souls meet again.

 

“MJ,” Peter stretches. “C’mon. Let’s go.”

 

“No,” Michelle hisses. “You can go, I’ll be there in a moment.”

 

Peter doesn’t go, he stands next to her, keeping a hand on her back. But he looked at the ground, Michelle’s eyes scanned the two people in front of her. 

 

Beatrice walked over to Tony first, she was taller than him in heels. She took off her hat, her hair hung in soft 40s like curls around her face. She peeled off her gloves and shoved them into her purse, along with her hat. 

 

A delicate hand reached up to Tony’s face, cupping his cheek softly. He leaned into the touch and shut his eyes tenderly. Michelle saw Tony flash to a younger age, a twenty-something year old with Beatrice- looking at her like she was the only thing to be seen. 

 

Beatrice doesn’t say hello, how’ve you been, I’ve missed you, to Tony. Instead, she asks a question. The words are affectionate and hold years of emotion in them. 

 

“When was the last time you slept, Tones?” 

 

Tony shrugs, turns his head and kisses her palm slightly. Tammy would call this a Nicholas Sparks moment. Tammy would fake throw up but you could tell, if you looked at her really hard, you could tell she wished she had a love like that. Someone to look at her like she was the only thing in the room.

 

“It’s been a while,” Tony answers. His eyes don’t have dark circles under them, or maybe they do, it’s hard to tell with his stupid glasses. 

 

Peter’s hand leaves Michelle’s back and when she looks up, he’s walking out of the room and into the dining room where everyone else is. Michelle pushes down her feelings. Down everything she wishes she could fucking say.

 

( _I miss you._

_ You’re so warm. _

_ I wish you didn’t put your life in danger all the time. People need you. _

_ I need you.  _

_ Don’t die, not now. _

_ I can’t lose you too. _

_ You’re beautiful. So beautiful. _ _ ) _

 

_ (I wish-  _

_ We are-  _

_ You are-) _

 

_ ( _ _ I think I love you.) _

 

Michelle looks at Beatrice and Tony again, holding hands now. Gently, not very noticeable. Michelle moves, walks out of the room roughly and sneaks past the dining room. Moving quickly, to a brutally lit hallway, leaning against the way with uneven breaths and a head moving a mile a minute. 

 

“What are you doing.” It’s not a question, Michelle looks over at the voice. It’s Nat, of course, nearly everyone is loud and uncivil, loud with stomping steps against hard flooring.  

 

Nat stands with her arms crossed, her hair is redder in this lighting. Part of it is up in a messy bun that looks neat and her clothing is casual. Shorts with the branding of Calvin Klein and with a racerback loosely fitted tank-top. She wears tennis shoes, black ones that are quiet. She eyes Michelle with a vague expression, nails painted red and gray. 

 

Michelle pushes herself off the way and stands straight before leaning back again and lowering herself to the floor like a coward. “Nothing. I’m doing nothing.” Her voice wavers and is anxious. Nat narrows her eyes further, Michelle’s skin crawls.

 

“You’re tense.”

 

“That happens,” Michelle says. “It’s difficult to be normal around a bunch of literal superheroes.”

 

Nat doesn’t smile, nor does she laugh. She walks over to Michelle, smoothly sitting next to the teenager on the floor. She doesn’t look at Michelle, but at the wall in front of them. “Tell me something about yourself, Michelle,” Nat says to the wall cooly. “Something real.”

 

“My cousin died a few years ago,” Michelle tells the wall. “It’s been hard.”

 

Nat says nothing in return, but she doesn’t tell Michelle to stop, and it feels good to talk about Caleb in a fresh way, so she keeps going.

 

“I hate that everyone expects me to be over it. My sister, Nicole, Cole, didn’t know him well. So she doesn’t seem really taken by it. My parents don’t like talking about it. And my aunt, the mom of my cousin, moved to Canada only a few months after he died. She still pays his apartment rent though. Like, I’ll go there and it’ll look the same. There’s dust and stuff, yeah. But it’s like he never left, his bed is still unmade. All the garbages and food are gone, because duh. But if I turn on the TV it still opens to the same episode of Golden Girls. In the spare bedroom, there’s still a bunch of my stuff because I was staying there, with him, when he died.”

 

Nat still stays quiet, her hand gently pats Michelle’s. Michelle keeps talking.

 

“It’s just… so tiring. Because he’s everywhere, I can’t escape it. He’s in all the shows I watch and in every fucking word I say or think. He’ll be standing behind me in the mirror, and when I turn around… he’s not there. The universe is playing a cosmic joke on me. And since everyone else is over it, or at least, trying to be, they expect me to be over it too. But I’m not. I’m not done with him yet, I’m not finished with him yet. Even if he died two years ago.”

 

It feels good, it does. It feels like she’s taking the breath for the first time in two motherfucking years. So she keeps going, keeps breathing.

 

“And… and, it’s not just him. Like, Caleb, my cousin, is gone. For good. So it’s hard to see people, alive people, in the same way. Knowing they can be gone in a moment. Knowing I might never say goodbye to them again…”

 

“Well,” Nat says softly. “There is always that possibility, always that chance. But you shouldn’t pull back from the people you care about because of the chance that they’ll be gone. In fact, you should pull them closer. Because you now know what it’s like to love then lose someone, and you’re able to understand how valuable time is. How important people can be.”

 

Nat finishes quietly, she stands up in a smooth move and walks away. Leaving Michelle alone, thinking about everything she just learned.

 

Michelle peaks at Tony and Beatrice in a living room when she’s on her way to the kitchen, they’re sitting on the couch now. Beatrice has her coat taken off along with her shoes. Tony is holding one of her hands with both of his and talking quietly. The hand that isn’t being held by Tony’s is on the back of his neck, rubbing the tips of his hair. He whispers something too quiet for Michelle to hear and Beatrice smiles watery at the words Tony speaks. 

 

“I’ve missed you,” Beatrice says softly, running her thumb down his jawline. Her eyes were rimmed with tears and she was shaking her head softly. Her hair was messier now, her boots, purse, and coat were hanging by the door. 

 

“No,” Tony said, one of his hands left hers and cupped Beatrice’s cheek like she had done to him earlier. “I missed  _ you. _ ”

 

Michelle sneaked across the room and headed to the dining room before she could hear any more. Even though she only heard them say seven words, she felt like she heard too much. 

 

_ The way they looked at each other _ , Michelle thought while she walked.  _ They looked at each other like the world was ending and it was their last moments. Like they wanted to ruin each other over and over and over again. Like they were each other’s north, south, east, and west. Like they went through all this life, all this fear and hope, and depression and growing. All of life, just to find each other again.  _

 

Michelle wanted that. Maybe. Just a bit. She did. And she knew who she wanted it from.

 

“MJ!” Peter yelled from the dining room, he was smiling at her now. He was standing now, got up from sitting next to a pretty brunette with nice lips. She eyes Michelle with a tilted head, before going back to her food. They all look up at Michelle, someone Michelle guesses is Bucky Barnes frowns at her. Michelle ducks her head and goes to the kitchen to make her own dinner, sub sandwiches.

 

Peter follows her into the kitchen, “you okay?”

 

“Yeah,” Michelle responds. “Of course, why wouldn’t I be.”

 

Peter pursed his lips and set a hand on her wrist. “MJ.”

 

“Peter. See, I can say names too.”

 

“Michelle,” he said. First time he called her Michelle since she told everyone to call her MJ. “Are you okay?”

 

Michelle breathed out harshly, looking at the hand on her wrist. Short fingernails with calluses. His hand was around her wrist and it was warm. He was warm. He was and was and was.

 

“I’m just tired, Pete. Just tired.” 

 

She wills her hand to move from his and walks over to the dining room, claiming she isn’t hungry. She sits in an open seat next to someone she thinks is Sam Wilson, Nat eyes her from across the table and Peter doesn’t come out of the kitchen for a good few minutes. Michelle has an ever-growing lump of guilt in her chest but she tries to ignore it, to put on a happy face. When Peter walks out, his mouth is smiling but it falls short at his eyes and he cracks his knuckles with his thumb, even when he cracks them all he still does it. Michelle avoids eye contact and doesn’t eat, someone slides her a soda and she opens it with one hand, keeping the other in her lap. Fingers picking at her cuticles and a hangnail.

 

The Avengers talk and laugh, say stories about their could've beens and almost haves. Peter listens and laughs at the right times, Michelle sits quietly, observing. Nat sits next to the brunette, keeping an arm on the back of her chair protectively, playing with the tips of her hair. It’s sweet. Bucky and Steve share a few hidden smiles, Peter doesn't look at Michelle at all and she forces down the constant scream crawling up her throat. All the words she wants to say.

 

“So,” the table goes quiet and they all look at Michelle. “You’re MJ.”

 

Michelle’s stomach squirms, her knees go into the phase that happens when she gets nervous. Her cuticles have started to bleed onto her jeans, but she pulls down the jacket sleeves, Peter’s jacket sleeves, she thinks in an instant. Michelle hides her hands with the sleeves that are slightly too long and folds them neatly in her lap. Sharp pains in her hands, blood seeping into the cuffs of the sweater. All the words she has ever wanted to say, she swallows. 

 

“Yeah, hi,” Michelle says looking up. The brunette pokes at a salad in front of her, and Michelle desperately wants to know her name. She’s the only one (besides Nat,) who isn’t giving Michelle a look of smugness. 

 

“How old are you?” The person next to her, Sam, asks. 

 

“Sixteen,” Michelle says, pushing down a wince at her bleeding finger. “Seventeen in May.”

 

“How do you know Parker?” Sam, once again, asks. 

 

“Grew up together,” Michelle supplies shortly. Before anyone can ask any more questions, Michelle excuses herself politely and walks out of the room, feeling more than one pair of eyes on her back. 

 

Michelle passes Tony on her way out of the room, Beatrice isn’t with him but Tony has a private smile on his face and seems happier than he was the first time she met him. He looks at her curiously but doesn’t say anything. Michelle quickly walks to the bathroom, putting her hand that isn’t bloody on the cold handle to turn only to find out it’s locked. 

 

She takes a step back, stands next to the door waiting. She pulls her sleeve up and looks at her hand, the hangnail that Michelle was picking at got worse, stung and felt like she was on fire. Her curled her toes in her socks and bit her lip hard enough to draw blood. She heard the toilet flush and water start, Michelle shoved the sleeve back down and whimpered at the pain. The door swung open and Beatrice stood, around Michelle’s height, maybe a little shorter but Michelle was slouching so she couldn’t quite tell. 

 

“Michelle,” Beatrice smiled kindly, quickly falling when she looked at Michelle for a second longer. “Are you alright?”

 

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Just need to go to the bathroom.” 

 

Beatrice didn’t look convinced, she tilted her head and somehow, she drew the words out of Michelle. “I hurt my hand,” Michelle whispered, pulling up the sleeve and presenting the hand to her. Beatrice takes Michelle’s hand in her own, slightly damp from water but warm. Manicured long nails that were a peach color. She tugged Michelle into the bathroom, sitting her down on the closed toilet and crouching down to get something under the sink. Like magic, she pulled out a first aid kit. Opening it on the marble sink, she grabbed a black bottle and cotton balls. 

 

“This will sting,” she told Michelle carefully. “But just breathe, it’ll be over in a moment.” 

 

Michelle squeezed her eyes shut tightly, breathing roughly and deep as Beatrice cleaned the cut. Beatrice continued to care for it, but Michelle kept her eyes closed, trying to ignore the stinging and went over the multiplication tables she learned in third grade. 

 

“So,” Beatrice said as she cleaned the cut and Michelle’s breathing started to stabilize. “Are you and Peter dating?”

 

Michelle coughed, something deep inside the abyss of her mind woke up and started to bang on the walls of her conscious. Beatrice looked up and smiled smoothly, confused, handing soft and careful as she cleaned the cut.

 

“No,” Michelle answered shortly. “We’re not.”

 

“Do you wish you were?”

 

Michelle stayed quiet, shrugging. The room was falling away from her and she was being pulled into the Christmas story. The fires and broken props, the extras and loud, so very loud, screaming.

 

Beatrice nodded understandingly, opening her mouth then shutting it. Opening it again. “I understand.”

 

“You do?”

 

“Yeah,” Beatrice said, wrapping the hangnail with gauze. “It’s hard being a teenager, it’s hard to be alive really. And it’s hard to love people, it’s hard to even _ like  _ people.”

 

“Yeah,” Michelle trails off. Her eyes look at the older woman in front of her, focusing on the bleeding hangnail.

 

“How old are you?” Michelle asks, curious. She doesn’t look as old as Tony.

 

Beatrice looks up at Michelle quickly before looking back down at her hand. “Forty-six.” 

 

“Tony said you have two kids.”

 

“I do,” Beatrice says. “One of them is a few years older than you, twenty. The other one is fourteen, she lives at school during the week and at home during the weekend. She’s with her dad now.”

 

“You’re divorced?” Michelle asked, even though she knew the answer.

 

Michelle eyed Michelle with a sly suspicion but answered the question. “Yes, we divorced a few years ago.”

 

“I’m tired of meeting new guys,” Michelle blurted out in a prickled way. Beatrice froze and looked up at Michelle expectedly. “I’m just tired.”

 

“I understand that, sweetie, I do.” Beatrice smiled sadly, patted Michelle’s knee.

 

“If you don’t mind me asking,” Michelle said softly. “What happened between you and Tony?”

 

Beatrice sighed heavily, sitting back against the wall in front of the toilet where Michelle was sitting. Michelle’s hand was covered with gauze now, wrapped and cleaned.

 

“We were in our twenties, everyone is a dumbass when they’re in their twenties. Tony was a mess, I was a mess. I was pregnant and he was in rehab for the second time that year. Our timing wasn’t right.”

 

“You were pregnant when you guys were dating?” Michelle asked.

 

Beatrice pushes a strand of hair out of her face, elegant hands with graceful mannerisms. “I met Tony a few months into my pregnancy, we weren’t dating yet. Tony didn’t mind.”

 

“But,” Beatrice added, “life got in the way. I was pregnant from a one night stand that I didn’t know the name of. Tony was on and off in rehab. We were messes. Huge messes. We were friends for about three months, I had my baby and we started dating. We broke up, I moved for work and slowly he got his life together.”

 

“Why didn’t you see him sooner?”

 

“I fell in love, I had another kid. I fell out of love, I watched my son grow up and heard about Tony and Iron Man, and Tony and Pepper. And I knew the timing wasn’t right. I didn’t expect the timing to ever be right, really. Then it was.”

 

“Did you ever,” Michelle paused. “Did you ever, like, wish you and Tony didn’t break up?”

 

“No, I’m glad we broke up. It was the right thing to do. But, I wish we would’ve gotten our shit together sooner.” Beatrice was standing now, organizing the first aid kit and putting it away.

 

“I’ve missed Tony, he- I- we were always the relationship I wished worked out.”

 

Beatrice looked at Michelle and smiled, she looked younger. Sweeter. Sad, but the good kind of sad. The sad that that had an underlying hope to it. The sad that took time, the kind of sad that danced and sang and was going to be okay.

 

Beatrice brought the light and took it with her.

 

Beatrice walked out of the bathroom and disappeared into the hallway. Michelle sat looking at the floor, in the darkness, thinking. 

 

“Parker!” Michelle called after him while the Avengers or such sat in the living room, movie night, they said it was. “Peter, goddamn it, slow down. Not everyone is a superhero.”

 

Michelle pants and Peter looks at her with a cold, blank face. “What’s up, Michelle?”

 

His voice stings, pains, stabs. Hurts like no pain Michelle has ever felt before, it isn’t the worse pain, but it’s pain. It’s not the pain she felt when she watched her parents fight for the first time, or when Caleb died, not like the pain she feels when she lays at the wall all day, mouth open and letting out a scream that has no sound. Not like the bullet in her back or the smile in her mirror, not like the cracked lips from the cold or the hangnail bleeding. Not like the look Cindy gave her from the hospital bed or the numbness in her knuckles after she hit Flash. The pain is… is… is…

 

Love. it’s love. It’s so fucking love.

 

“I’m sorry, for earlier, I mean. It wasn’t, I’m not- I’m just sorry. I guess.”

 

Michelle aims all the words as the floor, says them quietly, maybe not even loud enough to be heard. She can hear people yelling about what movie to watch, she can feel Peter’s eyes on her. 

 

“It’s okay,” Peter mumbles. “It’s fine.”

 

“But it’s not,” Michelle snips at him. “I was mean.”

 

“You’re always mean.”

 

Michelle winces quietly, looking at Peter than the wall.  _ Ouch. _

 

“I like that about you though,” Peter tells her. “It makes me happier when you’re nice to me, because, MJ, you’re just. Just.”

 

Michelle reaches for his hand and squeezes it tightly, she smiles like a secret, like the end of a song. Like a flower, like every direction. Like north, south, east, and west.

 

Then she lets go and walks to the living room, seeing everyone sitting and smiling. Everyone has their own spot, a bunch of superheroes fighting over what movie to watch. It’s a nice sight, Michelle’s eyes catch on Tony and Beatrice sitting on a couch together, one of Tony’s arms around the back of the couch, gently stroking Beatrice’s hair as they both look at the large TV screen.

 

“If you try making us watch anything by Tarantino tonight, I’m going to fucking scream,” Nat notes, sitting next to the same brunette from dinner, sharing a bowl of chips. 

 

“Quentin Tarantino is a genius, excuse you,” Clint snaps back. But he scrolls past both of the Kill Bill’s. Sam takes the remote from Clint, smiling and not phased when Clint frowns and throws an unopened box of Milk Duds at him.

 

Michelle sits in front of Nat and the brunette on the couch, leaning against the arm of the couch, watching the screen quietly. Peter walks in with two sodas and a bowl of popcorn, sitting next to Michelle and handing her a cherry cola. 

 

“How ‘bout Hot Fuzz?” Sam asks when they scroll to it on Netflix.

 

The movie that Caleb had in the passenger seat in his car, the one he wanted to watch with Michelle. 

 

“No!” Michelle yelps out when they get to it, Sam looks at her like she’s crazy. “I don’t like that movie.”

 

Nobody says a word about it, Sam just keeps scrolling. They all settle on watching Little Miss Sunshine, a movie Michelle has never seen before, she pays attention. Halfway through the movie, Peter is grabbing a pillow and laying it in her lap along with his head. He’s falling asleep before the Hoover’s are even at the beauty pageant. She plays with Peter’s hair because she wants to know if it’s as soft as it looks (it is) and to keep Peter asleep because she knows the most hours of sleep he gets at night is four or five. Michelle can feel the other people in the room looking at her, besides Nat, but she ignores it. The movie is more interesting anyway.

 

Peter is awake before the movie is over, head still laying in Michelle’s lap as he watches the movie. When Michelle looks behind her shoulder, the brunette is asleep on Nat’s shoulder, a blanket covering both of their legs. Nat smiles slightly when she notices Michelle looking before turning back at the TV.

 

The movie ends and someone starts playing another one, The Incredibles, a movie Michelle has seen many times. When Michelle’s phone starts to ring (ringtone is now High Enough by K.Flay), she pats Peter’s head and pushes the green answer button while she wanders out of the room. The light in the kitchen is dim, less harsh than the hallway lights. “Hello?” 

 

“How’s Stark’s?” Frankie says smugly, Michelle can faintly hear loud music in the background and the blender. 

 

“It’s fine, thank you,” Michelle responds leaning against the kitchen counter, jumping up to sit atop of it. 

 

“I’m just checking up, everything okay?”

 

“Yeah, yeah. Everything’s fine. We just watched Little Miss Sunshine and now The Incredibles.”

 

“Ah,” Frankie says shortly. “Movie night, huh? I’ve been there for quite a few of them, Clint has made us watch Kill Bill more times than I can count.”

 

Michelle laughs quietly, feeling like she’s being watched, she looks over her shoulder. Of course, there’s no one. But the feeling doesn’t go away.

 

“Is everything cool between you and your  _ boyfriend _ ?”

 

“I hate you,” Michelle says dryly. “You’re the worst and I hate you.”

 

Frankie just laughs, long and loud; happy.

 

“I’m gonna go, Cole and I are watching Wreck-It Ralph and making smoothies.”

 

“Okay, love you,” Michelle said lastly.

 

“Love you too, have fun with your boyfriend.”

 

“He’s not-” Michelle started but the phone call was over and she was left staring at her phone with a slight smile.

 

Michelle thinks, looking around the kitchen that most likely costs more than her whole fucking house. Caleb would’ve liked it, he would’ve said it would be in his retirement house. The retirement house he never would get. He would never, he would never, he would never-

 

“MJ?” Peter’s voice was impossibly soft and he walked over to her. His hair was messy, curly and hung in front of his eyes slightly. He needed a haircut, Michelle hoped he wouldn’t get one. His eyes were hazy and he made a tiny noise in the back of his throat at the brighter lights than the very dark living room he was in only a moment ago. “You alright?”

 

“Yeah,” Michelle looked up. “I was just talking to Frankie.”

 

“Okay, just making sure.” He smiled brightly, beaming from the inside out. Light. 

 

“Come here,” Michelle said. “Your hair’s sticking up, lemme fix it.”

 

Peter walked over to her, closer, standing between her legs as she fixed his hair. It shouldn’t have felt as intimate as it did. His head bowed slightly forward, curls rushing ahead and messy. Michelle bit back a smile as she fixed his hair.

 

“There,” she said satisfied. “Much better.”

 

Peter looked up and grinned. He looked younger when he smiled, he looked like the kid Michelle met so many years ago.

 

“You’re beautiful,” Michelle said before she could think about it. The words were in the light and a blush was working its way up both their faces.

 

“You,” Peter whispered. “You really think so?”

 

His face was red and he was avoiding eye contact, head ducked and his blush was red and blotchy. 

 

“Yeah,” Michelle said lifting a cold hand to his cheek. “You are.”

 

They were close, as they were earlier and even earlier before that. Breathing the same air and ghosting lips  _ nearly  _ brushing. It was so close, like it always is. They were so close. Nearly there. So, so, so-

 

It was a brush of lips, a dance of nerves, warm and comforting and soft. It lasted a fraction of a second, if that, then Peter was gone. Taking the warmth he carried with him everywhere with him, leaving Michelle on the counter, cold and baffled. Wondering why he left as Tony walked in with an empty bowl of popcorn. 

 

Fucking spider senses. 

 

“You good?” Tony asked, opening a cupboard and getting some microwave popcorn.

 

“Yeah, yeah. I’m good.”

 

_ Did he mean it?  _ Michelle thought as she jumped off the counter and walked slowly to the living room.  _ Did he mean it? Did he mean it? Did he mean it? _

  
_Did he?_  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you liked it! comments and kudos are gold stars so leave them so i can smile for eight hours straight at them. hope you enjoyed this chapter <33


	11. I KNOW IT IS SELFISH BUT I AM STILL WAITING

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is shorter than the other chapters but I really really wanted to publish it. I can't get Michelle and Tony having a deep convo out of my mind. So I wrote it, plus it has some back story and MJ's doubts. I hope you all enjoy.

He was in the lab at two am, when Michelle found her way there. 

 

Michelle was in her own room this time. Laying in her bed with the curtains opened, her bag at the foot of her bed, charger in the plugin next to her. The room smelt too clean and too neat. It felt like she was on the set of a movie, not real. All fake, all posed. 

 

Michelle stayed on her phone most of the time, scrolling through Instagram and Tumblr, reading easy posts. Not the ones about the government or climate change, those she saved for the day. When the anger she always held in was at its peak. At night she read poetry, usually. Or movie reviews, things that kept her mind at ease. Ones that didn’t take as much thought as her anger did. 

 

Normally, during the weekends, she stayed in bed. Or in her house, at least. Laid on the floor or the couch, watching the same shows and movies.  _ Like she was trying to sleep away the past week. _

 

But now… she was awake and it was nearing three am. Peter was most likely asleep, and all the other stupid Avengers had their own floors and shit, so they couldn’t even hear Michelle quietly stuffing her phone in her sweatpants pocket and turning the doorknob carefully, making sure to keep her movements swift and light.

 

Michelle walked to the lab quietly, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, noting that all the lights in the bright hallways were now duskier and calm. Like the building too, was going to sleep.

 

Michelle opened the large glass door with a whoosh of air and distinct smells blasting her. Tony was playing a rerun of a TV show on a large flat screen as he was working on something with his back to her muttering words under his breath.

 

“What you watching?” Michelle asked, standing in front of the glass door, watching as Tony’s shoulders stiffened and he looked at her.

 

“ _ Cheers _ ,” Tony said turning away from Michelle again. Michelle padded her way over to him, taking a seat on a stool next to where Tony was working. She set her phone down gently and looked over to him.

 

“I didn’t peg you as a Cheers guy, Stark.”

 

“I’m not,” Tony replied without looking up. “My dad liked it, helps me focus.”

 

Tony didn’t say anything else, Michelle looked ahead, picked at the gauze on her hand and sighed deeply. “Okay, Listen.”

 

When Tony didn’t look up at her, Michelle leaned forward and yanked one of the tools in Tony’s hand. “Michelle, stop.”

 

“No, listen. I have an important question, and you’re the only person that can answer it your way.” Michelle looked at him seriously, “just,  _ listen. _ Damn.”

 

Tony sighed and grabbed a stool that was behind him, sitting down roughly and putting his head in one of his hands while looking over at Michelle. “What?”

 

“Why’d you do it?” Michelle asked, moving her hand with her words. “Why’d you do it?”

 

“Do what? Come down here-”

 

“No, no, no,” Michelle said, “not that. I can guess why you’re down here. That easy. That’s so fucking easy to know.”

 

Tony didn’t look impressed. 

 

“No, why’d you cheat on her?” Michelle asked again. “Like, I know why you broke up, you were both messes. It was the 90s and you two were in your twenties. But  _ why _ ?”

 

Tony sighed deeply, exasperated. His nails had dirt under them, eyes with bags and his skin looked pale. “We broke up-”

 

“That’s not what I’m asking, Stark,” Michelle quipped, “I’m asking why you did what you did.  _ Why? _ ”

 

“Michelle,” Tony began. “That’d take a while to explain, it happened a long time ago.”

 

“I’ve got time,” Michelle urged. “It’s two am, you’re not going to bed anytime soon and neither am I. You might as well tell me.”

 

Tony shot her a look, angry but not enough to scare her off. Michelle guessed it was the sluggish and exhaustion state he was in. He took the tool from Michelle and turned down the TV. Michelle guessed he was done with her, so Michelle sighed and started to stand.

 

“I met Bea when she was six months pregnant and I was just out of rehab. We were just bad, so bad. So we stayed friends.”

 

Michelle sat back down, putting her head in her hand and watching Tony. Listening. 

 

“Her son was a month early, she called me to take her to the hospital. Hand me that will you? Anyway, she named her son Atticus after the character in To Kill a Mockingbird. After Atticus was born, Bea fell into a terrible postpartum depression. It was awful. She stayed at my house a lot, had trouble caring for her baby and caring for herself. She would spend all day in bed or taking care of her child, but when Atticus went to sleep, she would cry and sob. I’d have to hug her and just coax all the emotions out of her. One time, one time she spent a whole week in bed, doing nothing. Then at four am one night, she went onto the balcony and screamed. It was terrible. It’s hard to see that. I cannot imagine what she felt when she went through that. Hand me the one with the blue handle,” Tony explained. Michelle handed him the small tool and he took it without looking at her. Continuing to talk. 

 

“She got better, slowly. And I thought I would too. I didn’t, but I tried. We started to date when her son was about a month old, so I had known her for about three months. It was hard, it was really difficult for a long time.” Tony kept working, stopping to write something down on a small blue notepad. 

 

“Yeah, okay. But why did you cheat?” Michelle wondered out loud, fiddling with a tool.

 

“Because, because I was scared. I was becoming a father figure, I was getting my life together. And I wasn’t ready yet.”

 

“But-” 

 

“Let me finish. I cheated on her because it felt easy. It was an easy way out. We were going to do long distance while she lived across the country for work for six months, but I cheated and we broke up.” Tony had stopped working while he spoke, soft and scarce. Like he was afraid someone was filming. He looked sad, older, stuck.

 

“Why did you and Pepper break up?” Michelle questioned. Tony’s eyes snapped back up and Michelle then looked down. He typed something in a computer, wrote something in a notebook and ran a hand through his hair. 

 

“I love Pepper, I really do. I wouldn’t be where I am without her, but sometimes things run their course and you’re left holding onto something that isn’t there anymore,” Tony sat down on another chair that was behind him. A bar stool, they were everywhere. And he rubbed his face, getting something like oil on his face.

 

“It seemed shorter than it actually was, it didn’t seem as long as it was. Because one second I was trying to get her to go out with me, the next we’re fighting in the kitchen over Brussel sprouts. And, we both just knew. Just like that. That it just wasn’t working anymore,” Tony looked off into the distance. Eyes glazed over and face holding so much sadness that Michelle couldn’t bare to look at it.

 

“Why didn’t you keep in touch with Beatrice? After all these years, I mean,” Michelle added after a few beats of quiet. The moon was shining brightly from across the lab through large windows. 

 

“It’s hard to see someone you love so much in pain. It really is, no matter what type of love it is, or what type of pain it is. And near the end, she was in pain. She was. We both were. I told her I cheated on her and, and you could just  _ see  _ it. She needed to move on with her life, she couldn’t stay still for me. So I just left it, I stopped talking to her. She moved and we said we were going to be friends, she tried calling me a few times but I let it go to voicemail. I didn’t keep in touch with her because, because it was better that way,” Tony said the words in a distant manner, like he was already out of the moment. Like it was already behind him.

 

“When did you realize you and Pepper weren’t working out? Or was it the last fight?” Michelle wanted answers, she really did. Not knowing things was something she couldn’t stand and it’s late, sleep comes and goes as she pleases but she can control on what answers she gets. 

 

“We were out for dinner, at a nice restaurant. And the waiter came,” Tony took a breath before talking again. He kept working on the project in front of him, focusing on it with a hazy view. 

 

“And I was the way she looked at the waiter that night. And I knew she wouldn’t do anything, she never did. But I saw the way she looked at the waiter that night. I knew it was pathetic of me to care, but I saw how she looked at the waiter that night. And I forgot the last time she looked at me like that. It hit me then, I think. Watching a person I loved at one point or another, look at another person the way they used to look at me.” Tony wasn’t working on the task anymore, he was playing with a ballpoint pen. His hair was messy and getting in his face. He looked on the verge of death.

 

“Did you ever look at anyone else when you were with Beatrice?”

 

“I don’t know. I really do not know. I don’t- I don’t think Pepper ever realized that she looked at the waiter like that, I don’t think  _ anybody  _ ever realizes how they look at others when they claim they’re in love with somebody. Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t. I like to  _ think  _ I didn’t, I like to think I only looked at Beatrice  **_that_ ** way. But once again, I don’t know. And I don’t think I should know,” Tony admitted. He was speaking quietly, words low and smooth but Michelle guessed that the room was soundproof. 

 

“What about timing?” Michelle pushed. She knew she was crossing the line, knew that this was starting to sound like something put in a newspaper. But it wasn’t. It was just. Just,  _ questions she couldn’t answer.  _

 

“What about it?”

 

“Why is it such a big deal?”

 

Tony sighed, something like a smile on his features. He looked over at the clock, at the room around them, at the glass walls and doors. The not-so-breakable breakable room. “Well, I could break it down and find some sort of equation or  _ something  _ like that to explain why it is as important as it is, but that’s useless. Timing is important in a relationship. It always is. And if the timing is wrong, you can force it. Love arrives exactly when it is supposed to, and leaves exactly when it must. Love is not something you can force on others… or yourself. Love is not up to you, I guess. Love is up to the universe.”

 

Michelle chuckles softly, noticing the coffee mugs and bags of take-out scattered around the large lab. “I didn’t think you were a romantic.”

 

Tony shrugs and grabs a coffee mug, taking a drink from it. “It’s something you learn over time, I definitely wasn’t a romantic fifteen years ago.”

 

“What if,” Michelle pauses and taps her fingers on the glass table. Seriously, nearly everything was glass and metal. All polished and perfect. “What if you don’t know if the timing is right? Like, it may be the right person and all but not the right timing?”

 

“Then you have to wait,” Tony carefully said. He so knew that she was talking about Peter.  _ God.  _ “sometimes all you can do is wait.”

 

“I’ve never been good at that,” Michelle admitted. 

 

“You’ll learn.” Tony yawned. “You’ll learn. And you’ll know.”

 

“Know what?”

 

“You’ll just know.”

 

Michelle looked down, her skin felt heavy and uncomfortable. Stretched across her skin too tightly, it felt like if she poked it with a thin needle, she could see her bones. Her knuckles might’ve still had blood on them from when she hit flash weeks ago. The friendship bracelets that Cindy, Betty, Liz and her all made for each other are tied on her wrists, some are starting to become more lose but it doesn’t matter. They’re hers. 

 

“You should go to bed, Tony,” Michelle tells him earnestly. “You look like shit.”

 

Tony laughs as Michelle smiles and stands up. “C’mon. Turn off the lights and go to bed. Even millionaire geniuses need a few hours of sleep.” 

 

Tony followed her out, when Michelle walked down the hallway and to the stairwell; she hoped -  _ hoped  _ \- that Tony didn’t go back into the lab. 

 

Michelle didn’t go back to her room, she walked to Peter’s room. Didn’t knock on the door, just opened it and turned on the light. “Wake up, Parker.”

 

Peter rolled over and opened his eyes slightly. (Michelle tried not to swoon at the way he looked, he was beautiful. What the fuck.)

 

“MJ? What? Go back to bed, It’s like four am,” Peter hazily mumbled before rolling over away from her. 

 

“Peter,” Michelle said as she walked over to him. “Wake up.”

 

He didn’t. That stupid fucker. That beautiful fucker. That- that- that-

 

Michelle grabbed the glass of water on his bedstand and dumped it on him. Peter grumbled and sat up quickly, hair wet and slightly curly. His eyes were blurry with sleep and his lips were parted.  _ God.  _

 

“What?” Peter spat out, it didn’t seem as mean as he wanted it to be. It just seemed tired and sickly sweet. 

 

Michelle sat down on the bed next to Peter, setting the glass down on the bedstand before getting comfortable. She grabbed his hand in her own and let the tears fall with grace. “What if you look at the waiter when we go out?”

 

Peter looked confused and worried, his hand was warm and felt alive. Too alive. He wiped her tears away with his other hand and looked scared. “ _ What?  _ MJ, you’re talking crazy. What’s going on?”

 

Michelle hiccuped for breath and let her head fall forward, “what if we don’t have enough time?” 

 

“MJ, Em, look at me,” Peter said worriedly. “ _ What’s going on? _ ”

 

“I don’t anything to change,” Michelle cried out. “I don’t want us to go rotten.”

 

“Em,” Peter whispered as he pulled her into a hug. “We’re going to be okay. Don’t worry. It’s gonna be okay.”

 

Michelle kept crying, leaning into Peter’s shoulder that smelled nice. Smelled like home.

 

“I like what we have, Em. don’t worry. We’re going to be okay.”

 

“ _ I like what we have too, _ ” Michelle sobbed out. Nearly incomprehensible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you all enjoyed!! thank you for reading!! <33


	12. THE PARTY HAS JUST BEGUN

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi!! sorry I haven't posted in a week or so, I tried writing a new chapter but it was so bad so I rewrote it. the end of this fic will be in a few chapters and I am very emotional about it. this chapter is a little rushed and random, but I don't mind it. I hope you all enjoy!

When Michelle woke up, she was acutely aware of her killer headache. The dried tears on her face and Peter’s heavy arm around her waist. Michelle crawled out of the bed carefully, forcing Peter’s arm off of her so she could move. Peter grumbled in his sleep but rolled over. Michelle glanced over at the clock on the wall, it reading six o’two am.  _ God _ . 

 

Michelle snuck out of the room, the hallway lights were bright again. Michelle squinted and looked down, head spiking pain and eyes going blank and dark for a moment. She fell against the wall, bringing her hands to her face. Pins and needles spiral around her body as she bends over and breathes slowly. So very slowly. 

 

When her vision comes back to her, Michelle stands up straighter, rubbing her eyes and yawning. She ponders down the hallway, not to the living room or kitchen, but to the gym. A room she hasn’t seen yet.

 

Michelle finds the room quickly, the door is heavier than she expected.  She sneaks through the door before it slams shut behind her, Michelle jumps at the loud noise. 

 

The gym is huge, as far as Michelle can see, there are a few other rooms within the large one that has the gym in it. She wanders to another room, one that doesn’t have a door. She walks in and sees it’s something like a break room. There are two couches, sitting opposite each other with a table in the middle. Two fridges like things with glass doors showing an assortment of drinks, waters and power drinks, and healthy snacks. Large windows that shine a bright light into the room. Michelle walks over and grabs a water bottle, holding it loosely in one hand while her eyes scan over the rest of the drinks. 

 

She doesn’t have school today, through the windows the snow still falls and it piles up and up. Michelle walks to the couch and sits down, shutting her eyes for a moment and thinking. Thinking too hard for someone as young as she was. Worrying over things that don’t need to be worried about. Over school and Cindy, Tammy and the fact that Caleb’s funeral was two years ago but every day it still feels like the morning after they buried him. Memory is not a friend. Nostalgia is not a friend. They only remind Michelle of what she no longer has but still wishes for. 

 

“You look like her,” a voice says from behind Michelle. She jumps at the voice, it is distinct and has the slightest accent to it. Michelle whirls around to see the brunette that was sitting with Nat. Her hair is in braids, lose ones, messy ones. They look rugged from the toss and turn of sleep. She wears joggers and a t-shirt, fuzzy and knitted socks. She doesn’t wear any makeup, no eyeliner or eyeshadow like she was wearing yesterday. She had dark circles under her eyes and her lips are chapped, but she’s still immensely beautiful. 

 

“Who?” Michelle asks, watching as the brunette walks to the fridge and takes out red Gatorade, sitting across from Michelle on the other couch. She opens the drink and takes a swig before answering. 

 

“Francine,” she says.

 

Michelle chuckles dryly, looking away to the window. “You should meet my sister. She looks more like Frankie more than I ever will.”

 

The brunette cocks her head, her eyes say something that Michelle does not understand. 

 

Michelle learns her name is Wanda Maximoff. She is powerful, has  _ abilities _ . But Michelle doesn’t push to see them. That feels impersonal. Like she is taking something from Wanda. 

 

She eats breakfast with Peter, Nat, Wanda, and Beatrice. They sit in front of the TV to eat. Let’s Make a Deal plays and they all watch along. Wanda and Nat sit on the love seat, Beatrice and Michelle sit on the couch and Peter sits on the floor in front of Michelle. They don’t talk much, chuckle at the parts of the show that are laugh-worthy and boo or cheer at the parts of the game show that demands it. When Tony comes out, Michelle moves to the floor so Tony can sit next to Beatrice. 

 

Eventually, the show ends and it rolls The Price is Right, a show Michelle has never cared for, but she watches it. They all sit until all the game shows end and the clock rings ten. Nat, Wanda, Peter, and Michelle stand up to leave. Beatrice and Tony stay behind, continuing to watch TV.

 

The clock rings every hour, Michelle spends her time with Peter in the library, sitting on the same couch, reading different books. Peter played with the tips of her hair, as she had done the night before. Michelle leaned into his touch. 

 

The clock rang twelve and Michelle and Peter go downstairs. Michelle has to go home, she has things to do. She has homework and as much as Stark’s huge place is cool, Michelle misses her house. 

 

It’s Beatrice who drives her home. Just the two of them, she said goodbye to Peter. To everyone she could. 

 

She said goodbye to Wanda, Steve smiled and bided his farewell. Sam and Clint gave her a goodbye fistbump and Bucky still seemed wary of her presence. But he said goodbye gruffly, before turning around and disappearing down the hallway with the Steve, Clint, and Sam.

 

Wanda smiled at her, “we’ll see you soon, I assume?”

 

Michelle nodded, smiling slightly. 

 

Nat punched Michelle’s shoulder gently, handing her a card with her phone number on it. “I’ll teach you how to shoot a gun, kiddo.” 

 

Michelle laughed and took the paper, tucking it in her jean pocket. Nat wrapped an arm around Wanda and walked to the elevator, smiling at Michelle as the metal doors closed. 

 

“I’ll see you later,” Peter whispered into her hair while the hugged. “Alright?”

 

Michelle had nodded, squeezing her eyes shut and wishing she could freeze time. It would be so much easier to hold on that way. Her hands grasped at his body, he was firm and warm, and so, so, alive. She breathed in and out slowly, fighting back tears for no good reason. Every time Peter was near she felt like crying, whether it be good or bad. 

 

Happy was going to drive her home, but Beatrice said she had to be going and said that she could drop Michelle off at home. Tony seemed disappointed that Beatrice was leaving, but Beatrice kissed his cheek and smiled in a private way. One hand cupping his cheek and the other holding his hand. She whispered something and nodded, Tony nodded back. Before hugging her closely. 

 

When Michelle said goodbye to Tony, he gave her the book. On Love. Michelle smiled and put the book in her bag. Tony smiled before walking back over to Beatrice. Tony and Peter tried walking them out, but it was cold and snowy so Beatrice made them stay inside.

 

Beatrice’s car was a Toyota, it was warm and she let Michelle play music from her phone. Beatrice hummed along to the music she knew, tapping the steering wheel. 

 

“What’s your daughter's name?”

 

Beatrice looked at Michelle for a second then back at the road, “Blythe.”

 

“That's a cool name,” Michelle told Beatrice while changing the song. Secrets by OneRepublic.

 

Beatrice hummed while changing lanes. “Blythe is a smart girl.”

 

“Is your last name still Valentine?” Michelle asks looking out the window, her bag was in the backseat. Beatrice wasn’t wearing her hat, showing her dark hair. Her hair was naturally curly, it was a little damp from a shower she took before they left and the snow falling rapidly outside. 

 

“Of sorts. It’s Beatrice Valentine-Cox. I wanted to have the same last name as my kids, both of them. My son, Atticus, his last name is Valentine. Blythe’s last name is Cox, the same last name as my husband. Well, ex-husband.” Beatrice checked her mirrors, her phone that was showing google maps, looked at Michelle and smiled. “How’d you know my last name was Valentine?”

 

Michelle looked down abashedly, “there was this… photo. From 1997, your name and Tony’s name was on the back. Along with a quote.”

 

Beatrice smiled and laughed slightly, but said nothing in response. They sat in silence beside the music for a good ten minutes. 

 

“Why didn’t Tony change his lifestyle if he loved you so much?” Michelle asked, the words were out and into the light. Beatrice’s light, before Michelle knew it. She winced at her own words. 

 

“Because he wasn’t going to change for me. It wasn’t the right time, he wasn’t ready yet. People start to change normally when they hit rock bottom.”

 

“When did he hit rock bottom? When did he start to change?”

 

“When it was too late for us.” 

 

Michelle stayed quiet against that response, what was she supposed to say?

 

“So,” Beatrice started on the empty road. The streets were covered in snow and icy, only Beatrice’s car was on the white, long, road. “How long have you been in love with Peter?”

 

Michelle choked on air and her eyes widened, wondering briefly how did Beatrice become so upfront with a girl she hardly knew. But then, Michelle realized, sometimes that helps. It’s easier to tell and ask people you don’t know very well things. To be undaunted. 

 

“I don’t know if I am,” Michelle said quietly looking at the side of Beatrice’s face then at the window. “I don’t know anything really, about Peter and I.”

 

“I bet you do,” Beatrice answered. “Maybe you’re just not willing to admit it.”

 

Michelle felt attacked, she tried to push down a blush and every thought she had about Peter away. She attempted to change the subject quickly, but Beatrice beat her to talking first. 

 

“Listen up, Michelle. I’m gonna tell you something that everyone tells kids but kids never listen to. Life moves fast. It does. One second you’re watching the sunset with your first boyfriend, waiting for him to kiss you because that’s what you’re told to want. Then you’re in high school, struggling with depression and all the bad things. Then you’re in college, then you’re pregnant and the timing is never right. Then you have a kid and the person you loved is gone. Then your son is talking, then walking, then he’s in school. Then you’re married and having another kid. Then your daughter is living as your son did, then your son is graduating as you did so many years ago. Then you’re getting divorced and your kids are becoming their own people. And you’re alone, waiting for the past to come back.”

 

Michelle didn’t understand, not at  _ all _ . 

 

“What I’m trying to say is, what I’m trying to say is that there is not enough time. That you can’t be wasting time on denying your feelings when the thing you want is near you.” Beatrice finished speaking as they pulled onto Michelle’s street. “You should tell him, Michelle. You really should.”

 

“Trust me, Michelle,” Beatrice said as Michelle leaned back to grab her bag from the seat behind them. “Time is not something to be wasted.”

 

Michelle smiled, “you and Tony should try again.”

 

Beatrice nodded and looked down, her eyes rimmed with wetness. Michelle jumped out of the car, over the pile of snow near the curb and onto the sidewalk. She spared one last look at Beatrice and waved. Beatrice waved back, smiling. She looked like the girl in the photo, sitting next to Tony Stark, so in love in 1997.

 

Michelle walked into her house with a sigh. She dropped her bag, kicked off her shoes, and peeled her coat off. She didn’t bother to go up to her bedroom. It was so far.

 

Michelle walked to the kitchen, listening for her family. Nicole and Frankie should be up by now, shouldn’t they? 

 

On the notepad on the fridge had a note written in Frankie’s neat penmanship. 

 

_ M,  _

_ N & I went to buy some food to make us all lunch. Home soon.  _

 

_ Xoxo, F _ .

 

They were at the store, they could’ve just texted her but Frankie had never been for that. She always liked leaving notes around the house for others to find. Frankie even left them around her own house, a place she didn’t spend as much time as she should at. Now Michelle knew how she could afford such a nice townhouse though. How she could buy nice clothes and go out for dinner with Michelle and Cole all the time. She was working for  _ Tony fucking Stark _ . 

 

_ God _ . 

 

Michelle ripped off the top paper on the notepad, putting it down on the counter next to her. She grabbed the pen that stuck to the fridge by a magnet and started to write. She had somewhere to be. Someone to visit.

 

Michelle changed from sweatpants and a t-shirt to jeans and a sweater Liz has loaned her before she moved. She put on combat boots and earmuffs, wearing her long coat and grabbing her wallet her mother got her a few Christmases ago.

 

Michelle sat alone on the subway, tapping her knees and keeping her hands in her pocket. Clutching each one onto her wallet and phone. She kept her eyes ahead and listened closely to her stop. Michelle stopped at a drugstore and picked up a bouquet of half-wilted flowers. 

 

_ “I’m sure you all had better plans than go to a funeral on this fine September day,” the pastor said smoothly. The sentence wasn’t mean, it was comforting. Michelle sat in the second row with Cole and her parents, grasping at tissues in her hands. Her head hung forward, listening to the pastor speak. Her aunt, her mother's sister, sat in front of Michelle.  _

 

_ A parent should not live longer than their own child, Michelle thought. Caleb should not have died like this. _

 

Michelle’s boots crunched upon the snow, a noise Michelle has always adored. She weaved her way through the snow, the mud, and slush, the gravestones that documented the dead. 

 

_ “We all had ideas for today, maybe to fly a kite, to go to the movies, to see your living loved ones. But no, you’re all here to honor the death of Caleb Harvey March. A son, a friend, a person who had a life.” _

 

_ There were flowers, everywhere. Michelle took a few bouquets home, so did her parents but she took a few for herself. She kept them on her windowsill, staring at them while her parents walked in and left her food that she would never eat.  _

 

Michelle stood in front of his grave, alone and slightly cold. She looked down at the stone and sighed. Flowers aimed at the ground like a weapon aimed down. 

 

“Hi, Caleb,” Michelle greeted shortly. “It’s been awhile.”

 

“How’ve you been? Well, don’t answer, it’s not even like you can-  _ god.  _ You’re dead, that’s how you are. Dead. Fuck, I’m sorry. They told me it was supposed to be easier…”

 

Michelle lifted up her hand to look at the flowers, there was already some on this grave. Dead and heavily dusted in snow, but they’re there. Someone cared enough to bring flowers beside Michelle. It made sense, Caleb was likable.

 

“I’m really mad at you, Caleb. Really, really. You’re gone, and I can’t bring you back. You’re gone and it’s my fault. I started this. You’re just… not here anymore. It’s bullshit. It’s stupid. You deserve to be here.”

 

Michelle went down on her knees and started to put the flowers down, organizing them to how Caleb would like it. Her hands were cold and so was her face, but nonetheless, she kept working. 

 

“Caleb, you’re not here anymore-” Michelle choked out. “And I shouldn’t be this mad at a dead person. But had to go, didn’t you? You just had to fucking  _ go _ . Goddamnit.” Michelle furiously wiped her eyes. Leaning forward, hands resting on her knees and breathing raggedly. 

 

“I know I didn’t know you as well as most, Caleb. But I think you’d want to be alive right now, I think you’d want to be breathing and dancing and laughing. Not six feet fucking underground because someone robbed you of life. Do you know how mad I am? I’m so mad. I’m so mad that you’re gone. So fucking mad. Because you’re gone but you’re here. You’re everywhere. I can’t go anywhere without seeing you, without being reminded of you. Without you showing up like you’re welcome to die and break my heart all over again.”

 

_ Michelle went a week without eating before she passed out in the middle of gym class. Everything was a blur, one moment she was doing the drills with Betty the next she was on the floor the next she was in an uncomfortable bed and Caleb was there. But he wasn’t. He wasn’t there. _

 

_ You should still be here. This isn’t fair. This isn’t fair. _

 

“You said that you’d be here for every birthday I had. You said you’d take me to the new Wonder Woman movie when it hit the cheap seats. You said you’d take a knitting class with me. You  _ promised. _ And you  _ broke  _ it,” Michelle sobbed out. Tears falling down her face and bouquet of flowers messy and getting watered by her tears.

 

“They said you died instantly. Just like you lived. You said that hearts don’t break, they only bend. And my heart is bent in half, Caleb. It’s on the verge of breaking because now you’re gone and that’s possible.”

 

_ Raymond and Maria Jones made Michelle start counseling. She sat in a stiff room with a licensed therapist twice a week and talked about what was making her want to die so badly.  _

 

_ Cole picked up the habit of watching Michelle eat, making sure she actually did it. Making sure her older sister chewed and swallowed.  _

 

“God. I can yell at you all I fucking want but you’re not here to listen. You’re never here to listen anymore.”

 

_ “He’s- he’s gone.” _

 

_ Michelle said nothing in return to her father, Cole sat next to her, asleep. Using Michelle’s summer jacket as a blanket and her own jacket as a pillow.  _

 

_ Michelle looked ahead, saying nothing. Something inside her swirled and twisted, making itself comfortable on her lungs and other organs. Tugging and whispering hurtful nothings at her. _

 

_ “He died instantly, no pain.” _

 

_ Raymond Jones said it as if it was something Caleb would’ve wanted. Caleb would’ve wanted not to die at all.  _

 

_ “He’s in a better place now.” _

 

The tears stop falling, she’s all out. Now it’s just silent sobs into the quiet, cold, cemetery. “You were supposed to be here for me. You were supposed to keep me from becoming what I am now.”

 

Michelle laughs, it’s strangled and rough to her hoarse voice. “Now I’m sad all the time and you’re dead.”

 

Michelle pulls out her wallet and takes out a neatly folded piece of paper. “You told me it’s okay to be afraid, and I am. Oh god, I am so scared. I’m really scared of living without you, I’m not alone anymore. I have friends now, and Avenger friends, which is wacko. But, I’m always going to be scared without you. Because you were supposed to teach me. You were supposed to be there. But, that’s okay. Because I’m gonna be okay. You said so yourself.” 

 

Michelle puts the paper in the middle of the bouquet of flowers, she stands up and wipes her tears. Walking out of the cemetery. 

 

_ They played decent music at his funeral, Michelle wasn’t sure if Caleb would like it.  _

 

_ Michelle wasn’t sure if she’d like music like she used to ever again. _

 

She gets home to Frankie and Cole making tacos. Michelle eats with them, they watch reruns of Phineas and Ferb in the living room. Her parents were supposed to be home yesterday, but their flight was delayed. So they’d be home the day after tomorrow. 

 

Michelle goes to bed early, spends the whole night dreaming about a world where everything was a different color of red. 

 

Michelle goes to school, her Christmas story tucked safely away in the back of her mind. Her head has stopped hurting and she is scared. But it’s okay. Caleb promised it was okay.

 

Frankie gives Michelle a ride to school with Cole, Michelle sits in the backseat. When they slow to a stop in front of the school, both Cole and Frankie turn to face her. Michelle feels small again. It’s not a welcome feeling. 

 

“Have a good day at school. Text me when I need to pick you up,” Frankie said smiling. Cole flashed her smile too,  _ they looked so much alike.  _

 

“Bye, Michelle,” Cole spoke, still smiling. Michelle got out of the car and walked inside the school. 

 

She was fine. It was fine. She could handle it. 

 

The day went by in a whirlwind. Everyone was tired. Betty and Ned walked into the school holding hands, Flash avoided anyone Michelle was near. He was afraid of her.  _ Good. _

 

When lunch hits, Cindy, Peter, Betty, Ned, and Michelle all sit with each other. They debate if Shane Dawson’s Jake Paul series was biased or not. Everyone  _ but  _ Peter thinks so. He always sees the best in people, even shitty YouTubers. Michelle bites back a laugh when she thinks that.

 

Then, just when everything seems to be going well, there is a loud, blaring sound. Screeching for all students to evacuate calmly. That there is a dangerous person near. 

 

Michelle knows it’s about Peter -  _ Spider-man.  _

 

She looks at the door for half a second, then at the seat across from her where Peter was sitting…

 

He’s gone. 

 

But when Michelle starts to leave the school behind all her panicking friends, she walks past the gym. Fucking Spider-man and another person in a suit are fighting. It reminds Michelle of a dance. A brutal tango. 

 

“MJ!” Ned yells back at her. When she doesn’t respond and stays looking at the gymnasium, Ned walks over. “MJ, let’s go!”

 

Michelle looks back at him with sore eyes, her heart hurts and she’s terrified. 

 

“I can’t leave him in here, Ned.”

 

Ned frowns, grabbing her wrist and tugging he speaks, “you have to. It’s not safe for you here.”

 

“It’s not safe for him either,” Michelle whispers lastly before drawing her hand out of his grasp and running to the gym. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you liked this new chapter! kudos and comments warm my heart! thanks for reading! <33


	13. PEOPLE ARE NOT BORN THIS WAY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey y'all, this chapter is sad. and the end is near. like maybe one more chapter than an epilogue. also, there is a slight reference to abuse but not said straightly. This chapter might be a mess and shitty but I like it. Hope you all enjoy!

_“Bring him back!!” Michelle screeched, talking for the first time since she was told he died. Wearing an oversized jersey she had been wearing for the last week, shorts and cheap flipflops. It wasn’t even bright outside, Michelle was standing in the front yard. Standing in the humid summer heat, the street lights lined up and attracting moths. Most of them flickering and nearly dead. Yellow._

 

_Maria Jones stood under the porch light, wearing a pale bathrobe and barefoot. Her face was bare from makeup and she was looking at her daughter sadly. The neighbors would be up if Michelle continued to scream bloody murder._

 

_“Bring him back! Bring him back!”_

 

Spider-man flew across the room swiftly, Michelle watched as something darted toward one of the hanging lights- it fell to the floor and shattered. Michelle jumped back and looked at the man, the villain, the one who was attacking the boy Michelle was stupidly in love with.

 

Web from Spider-man’s wrist toward the man on the other side of the gym. It didn’t even slow him down.

 

_“Michelle, come back inside. You’re going to wake the neighbors,” Maria Jones coaxed from the steps. “Come back inside.”_

 

_“Bring him back! Bring him back!” Michelle continued to shriek. Head shaking and stomping, her voice was hoarse from not talking and her stomach hurts from no food. Only drinking water on an empty stomach, a feeling that is so very addicting._

 

_“Michelle, he’s gone. There’s nothing we can do.”_

 

A crash, glass splatters across the room. Blood. Michelle didn’t feel comforted like she did when she was near blood, no, her stomach twisted itself into knots. Her eyes watered and she stood, frozen, in the doorway. Watching the two fight with shock.

 

“Why are you doing this?” Peter yelled, swinging and shooting. _Dance._ Michelle thought. _It’s a dance. They’re dancing. They’re dancing until someone misses a step._

 

“You know why,” the man laughed. Something like a fire fell from his hands.

 

_“No!” Michelle sat on the grass, head falling into her hands. “Bring him back,” she whimpered._

 

_Maria walked over to her daughter, “I know, baby. I know.”_

 

Peter let go and fell through the air. He aimed a wrist at a half broken light and ran a few steps, before he was up, up, up.

 

Peter kicked the man and ran again, up the goddamn wall. The man shouted and so did Peter, Michelle covered her mouth to muffle her own.

 

_“MJ,” Caleb started. “Let's go home.”_

 

_Michelle bit back a sob, fisting her hands at her sides. She looked down and stomped her foot on the cement of the road._

 

_“You can’t,” Michelle croaked. “You’re not real. This isn’t real.”_

 

_Caleb looked confused, his eyes started to cry blood._

 

“Peter, look out!”

 

The man was about to blast something else at Peter, then he was looking at Michelle. And so was Peter.

 

“Who’s this pretty little thing?”

 

Michelle stood glued in her spot, eyes wide and mouth agape. The man smiled and Michelle was taken aback to being at her aunt's school, the taste of blood in her mouth and the sound of a man’s yell in her ears. The curls on the man's head and the smile that still haunts her dreams.

 

“She has nothing to do with this!” Peter yelled, “leave her alone.”

 

The man’s smile turned sinister. He moved over to Michelle in few steps, his hand moving up to her face. He brushed back her hair and cupped her chin, Michelle bit her cheek and shut her eyes. Knowing this will be over. The good guy will win. Spider-man will win. Peter will win.

 

“Oh, Spidey,” the man all but cackled. “She has _everything_ to do with this.”

 

Then everything was black and the last thing she heard was a strong gust of wind and Peter’s scream.

 

_“Where are you going?”_

 

_Her aunt froze in the doorway, she kept one hand on her roller suitcase and turned toward her niece. Her face was etched and scarred sharp pain and sorrow._

 

_“I can’t stay here, Michelle.”_

 

_Michelle’s aunt was young, so young. Too young for a dead child. She had Caleb at eighteen. She was only forty now. With a dead kid._

 

_“You can’t just leave.”_

 

_She smiled sadly, walking over to Michelle and crouching to her height. “I need to go.”_

 

_“But-”_

 

_“Oh, Michelle,” her Aunt Julia looked up at Michelle. “There is no room for me anymore.”_

 

When Michelle woke up there was a sickly sweet smell that reminded Michelle of a bakery where all the food has gone bad. She scrunched her nose in disgust, the room was dimly lit but nice. Neat. it wasn’t as she expected a lair to look like. In front of her was a table filled with things to make drinks, and cheese and crackers. Music played, soft in the background. Something old and classy. The room wasn’t how Michelle wanted it to look.

 

“You’re awake.” The voice belonged to a female.

 

Michelle tried to rub her eyes only to see they were locked with zip ties to the chair. “I am. How long was I out?”

 

The voice was behind her and Michelle couldn’t look at her, “a few hours. He left right after he dropped you off.”

 

“Who did?”

 

“You know who,” the voice spat out. “And to think, when I first met Spidey, he said there wasn’t a girl.”

 

Michelle shrugged as best as she could, “we aren’t an item.”

 

“No one looks at each other like that if they’re not an item.”

 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

 

The voice laughed, it was joyful. Sounded genuine. “My man's suit has a camera in it, don’t lie to me.”

 

_My man._

 

The voice walked in front of Michelle, back to her. She was wearing something you’d see in a fifties TIME ad. It was a halter top, tied in a neat bow behind her neck. Revealing a part of smooth skin covered in freckles. The dress was light blue and had tons of light pink and magenta flowers on it. Her hair was short and curly, she was wearing heels and had perfect posture. It’s an outfit Frankie would like, it’s an outfit Blake Lively would wear. Michelle loves it, and she hates herself for it. Beautiful things are hard to hate.

 

The woman turned around and smiled at Michelle, her eyes were light and full of life. Her makeup was minimal. Twenty-nine or thirty. She looked like a movie star.

 

“There’s always a girl,” she persisted. “Always.”

 

“What’s your name?” Michelle pushed to avoid the subject. The chair uncomfortable, her hair was falling in her face. She was cold. And hungry.

 

“Why?”

 

“Well, you know _my_ man’s name and you know my name, so it’d be fair if I knew yours,” Michelle trailed off. Leaning back in the chair, trying to get comfortable. Failing.

 

“My name is Ruby.” Her voice rang through Michelle’s ears, watching as she turned around and made a drink in a cocktail glass. “Are you hungry?”

 

“Are you going to poison me?”

 

“What?” Ruby snapped, “no! Of course not! I’m not a killer.”

 

“So you’re just dating one?”

 

Ruby frowned, turning to Michelle. “Are you hungry or not?”

 

Michelle looked at the floor and nodded, “food would be nice.”

 

Ruby looked at Michelle for a few more moments, thinking. “If I untie you, are you gonna put up a fight? Because I’m not part of whatever he does.”

 

They both knew who _he_ was without having to say his name. Michelle didn’t know it, anyway.

 

“Why would untie me?”

 

Ruby sighed, crossing her arms and leaning against the table filled with an assortment of drinks. “Because you need food. You can’t eat if you’re tied up. And I’m not gonna feed you like you’re a child.”

 

She _should_ put up a fight, should find the nearest exit and run. But that was so hard, and life was requiring more of a fight right now than it normally did. And Michelle was so fucking tired. Peter was supposed to be here by now. Michelle was supposed to be at home, watching TV. Letting her Christmas story rest. So Michelle shrugged and nodded, “I won’t fight you.”

 

Ruby smiled, leaving the room, her heels tapping against the floor. She walked back in a few moments later, holding scissors. She cuts the zip ties, with meticulous hands. Nails painted white and yellow. Ruby was like Beatrice or Mrs. Flores, classy and all seeking. The star of the goddamn show. Ruby walked to the other side of the room and grabbed the short glass, handing it to Michelle. “It's Sprite.”

 

Michelle stood up and stumbled, her legs numb. “Follow me,” Ruby called out while walking out of the room. Michelle slightly ran to catch up to Ruby. Taking a sip from the Sprite.

 

The kitchen was big and polished. Neat, on the stove, there was a tea kettle and Ruby motioned for Michelle to sit at a small dining room table tucked in the corner. “Why are you with him?”

 

Ruby looked over at Michelle, her face had an ache that Michelle couldn’t explain. “I don’t understand what you’re asking.”

 

“I don’t know his name,” Michelle sighed. “Why are you with him?”

 

“He treats me well.”

 

“Does he now,” Michelle cocked her head. “Does he?”

 

“He keeps me out of it, you’re the only one that he’s ever taken to our house.” Ruby grabbed a carrot out of the fridge and a knife from a vessel under a window. She started to cut it, looking like a housewife right out of a movie. Someone made for male fantasies. It pissed Michelle off to no end.

 

“Why’d he take me here?”

 

Ruby stopped cutting and held her head up to the window, where it was starting to snow again and the sun was slowly setting. Stress held her figure upright, her freckled shoulders were tense and her neck was too. Poor Ruby.

 

“He didn’t expect Spider-man to be as young as he was. He didn’t want to hurt you, so he took you to our house. To make you feel, safer, I guess.”

 

“I didn’t think you’re supposed to feel safe when you’re kidnapped,” Michelle responded.

 

Ruby shrugged, kept cutting. “He said it wasn’t going to be for very long.”

 

Michelle stayed quiet, faintly wondering if Ruby had anyone to talk to. If she locked up in a world she didn’t sign up for. Stirring her Sprite slightly. Subconsciously.

 

“He said it was only to be six months, a year, tops. But… the money was good, and he said he was changing the world. He wasn’t born that way, you know. He was a lab experiment gone wrong as everyone is in comics or movies. He said he was doing it for good. Plus, he bought me gifts. He told me it was all for the future we had together. And doesn’t everyone want that? Someone to tell you you’re beautiful and that everything they do is for a life you build with one another?” Ruby spoke while turning around, holding a cutting board and setting it on the kitchen island. She swept the carrot into a bowl and grabbed a potato, starting to cut it.

 

“Trust me, Michelle. I don’t want you to be here. I think you aren’t part of this-” _She has everything to do with this._ “-and if we’re being honest, I don’t want to be here either. There is no reason for me to stay anymore, and my mother used to say, that no reason to stay is a good enough to reason to leave. But, he loves me. And I love him. Or, I used to. I really did. But…”

 

_“Michelle! Have you seen Aunt Julia?” Nicole called out to Michelle while racing down the steps. Their parents weren’t up yet, it was Saturday and Michelle was laying on the living room floor watching Cartoons. Even if she was a little too old for them._

 

_“Have you seen her?” Michelle stayed quiet, staring at the TV. Her aunt's cold words echoing in her mind._

 

_“I can’t stay here anymore. I’m suffocating. If you ever feel that way, just call me. I’ll always be here.”_

 

“You can always go. There’s always somewhere for you to go.”

 

“Oh, Michelle,” Ruby looked up at Michelle. “There is no room for me anymore.”

 

And Ruby looked so much like her aunt Julia that Michelle felt like her like was collapsing around her. That maybe Ruby too, had a dead son. That maybe she also had a dead husband. That maybe, maybe in another life, Ruby was Michelle’s aunt. Maybe in another life, Ruby was crouching in front of Michelle, only a week after Caleb’s funeral, telling her that this _isn’t the life she was meant to have._

 

“Are you scared?”

 

Ruby scoffed, shaking her head. Cutting celery now. “Of course not. I’m just stuck. I felt like I was supposed to be so much before this age.”

 

“How old are you?” Michelle pondered gently.

 

“Older than you.”

 

“No shit, Sherlock,” Michelle snapped while standing up. She set down her drink and walked over to a photograph on the wall. Framed. It was of who Michelle assumed was a younger Ruby, twenty-one or so, smiling and high-waisted jeans and a white turtleneck. She wasn’t looking into the camera, she was holding a bouquet of flowers and smiling down at it. She looked less stressed, happier.

 

Now she looked tired. Still, like a movie star. But a movie star after the part of their life when Hollywood wouldn’t hire them. When they got divorced or tried drugs. Like a movie star after the fall.

 

“What’s your job?” Michelle asked, turning around and looking at Ruby. Ruby looked up from stirring a pot on the stove. She shrugged. “I was a beautician.”

 

“Past tense?”

 

Ruby nodded shortly, “past tense.”

 

“What happened?”

 

Ruby sighed, grabbing two bowls from a cupboard and a ladle from a drawer. “I lost all of my cares for anything besides the life I was building with him. And by the time I realized I could still be my own person and somebody to him, it was far too late.”

 

“You remind me of someone.”

 

Ruby looked up while scooping something like soup into two bowls, “oh really? What are they like?”

 

“Nice. Young. Too young, y’know? Like, she always looked too young to be the adult she was. She was really young and yet she was a grown woman and had a whole damn life, but she still seemed so _damn young,_ ” Michelle explained while walking over to Ruby and grabbing a bowl full of soup. Ruby hummed and walked behind Michelle to sit at the dining room table.

 

“What… what happened to her?” Ruby asked quietly, sitting in front of Michelle and sipping on her own short glass.

 

“Her son died, and she moved far, far away.”

 

“That’s unfortunate.” Ruby took a bite of her soup and then looked out the window. The woman from years ago still locked and loaded, ready to get up and leave.

 

“As life normally is,” Michelle responded. Ruby looked at Michelle with a sympathetic expression. Ruby understood. Even if she didn’t like it.

 

After they finished the soup, Ruby made Michelle sit at the table while she filled the dishwasher. It felt domestic. And by the looks of it, Ruby did this all the time. She was always at home, she probably had few friends now. She was trapped in a life she never signed up for.

 

“Why won’t you let me go?”

 

Ruby shut the dishwasher ruffly and sighed dejectedly. “Because I _can’t._ ”

 

“You could. You could come with me. You’d never have to see him again.”

 

“He’d still be everywhere,” Ruby responded, standing behind the kitchen island and crossing her arms. “There is no escaping a person you loved or love, or…”

 

“When’s he getting back?” Michelle asked quickly, changing the subject desperately.

 

Ruby shrugged, “I don’t know. Not till late, most likely.”

 

“Please,” Michelle begged.

 

“You know I can’t.”

 

“You can.”

 

“Where would I go, Michelle? I lost touch with humanity years ago! This,” Ruby gestures around her, “Has been my life. It is my life. What the else would I do?”

 

“Go back home.”

 

Ruby’s hands clutch at the kitchen island, her head hangs and her hair starts to fall out of its perfect curls. She shuts her eyes and sighs deeply. “Get up.”

 

Michelle stands and watches as Ruby uses one hand to take off her heels and the other leans against the island. She looks at Michelle and frowns, “we can go. We’ll have to be quick.”

 

Ruby heads down a hallway and Michelle runs to keep up, she watches as Ruby opens a door and it reveals a closet. Huge. Full of clothes, half of it is mostly for men. Lots of suits and expensive clothes that remind Michelle of Tony. The other half is for Ruby, most of it clothes that are from different decades. There are shelves for shoes, all types. Ruby throws open another door and takes out a suitcase. Dusty. She opens it and turns around to Michelle, scared.

 

“Do you know how to get to your boy’s?”

 

Michelle nodded, slightly dazed. “Good, we’re going there for now.”

 

“I’m confused, twenty minutes ago you said you can’t leave. But now you can?”

 

“Don’t ask stupid questions, Michelle.”

 

“Duly noted.”

 

Ruby packs quickly, she’s holding a pair of plaid pants when she eyes Michelle and frowns deeply. “You need to change.”

 

_“Michelle, it’s time for you to go to school!”_

 

_There was no response._

 

_“Michelle! School!”_

 

_No response._

 

_“Cole, go check on your sister.”_

 

_The bed was empty, her window was open, the curtains floating up with each gust of air. “Dad! Michelle’s not here!”_

 

“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?” Michelle snipped at Ruby. She was wearing jeans from the day before, she slept in them, and a sweatshirt with her hightops, it was easy.

 

“It’s not enough. Choose out something from my side of the closet, anything that isn’t too fancy. You need to blend in with me.”

 

_“Michelle, it’s dad. Where are you?”_

 

_“Michelle, pick up your phone.”_

 

_“Michelle, we’re all really worried. Pick up.”_

 

_“Michelle, please. We’re about to call the cops.”_

 

_“Michelle, I know it hurts. But being there won’t help.”_

 

Michelle didn’t know what to choose. She looked over at Ruby who was still packing. “What am I supposed to wear?”

 

Ruby opened a drawer and grabbed dark green pants and suspenders, she took a white shirt off of a hanger. Grabbed black heels from a shelf. “Wear these.”

 

“It looks uncomfortable.”

 

“Just wear it, we wanna be out of he ASAP.”

 

They walked out wearing sunglasses and long coats. They stood in silence on the way down in the elevator, Michelle was holding the suitcase. They smiled at the doorman and hailed a taxi.

 

“Where are we going, Ruby?”

 

“Wherever would be safe.”

 

So she gave them Frankie’s address, a house Michelle knew would be empty and knew where the spare key was kept. Frankie was still at Michelle’s own house. Michelle took her shoes off on the doorsteps. Heels fucking hurt.

 

They walked into the townhouse in silence and Michelle opened the suitcase and grabbed her jeans from them, she took out the card from her front pocket. She went to the landline in the kitchen. Frankie always insisted on having one. She typed the number from the card into the buttons on the home phone.

 

“Romanoff.”

 

“It’s Michelle.”

 

_When Raymond Jones walked into Caleb’s apartment, he saw his daughter sitting in front of the TV. Rewinding the same scene from Golden Girls. He sat in front of his oldest daughter and tried to get her dazed eyes on him._

 

_“Michelle, honey, it’s only going to hurt more.”_

 

_Michelle didn’t respond, only rewinded the scene again. “He said Rose was the heart of the group, said Betty White had been a grandma’s age since she was born.”_

 

_Michelle laughed dryly. “He said. He’s gone.”_

 

“Michelle? God, where are you? Peter’s worried sick here and the man that kidnapped you is off the radar. Where are you?”

 

“At Frankie’s. With the girlfriend,” Michelle lowered her voice. “I think he did something to her. I don’t know. But she’s with me. Just hurry. I’ll text you the address.”

 

“No need, Stark knows. We’ll be there soon.” Nat hung up without a goodbye.

 

Michelle walked into the living room to see the front door open and Ruby giving Michelle a pleading look. Michelle took a few more steps into the room and saw the man with a gun to Ruby’s back standing in front of the door. His smile was sickly.

 

“Hello, Michelle,” his voice was unsettling and far away. Ruby was holding Michelle’s eye contact with frightened eyes. “How are you?”

 

Michelle said nothing in response. The man was wearing a tailored suit now, his hair swept back. He cleaned up well. He and Ruby were both beautiful, it was easy to understand why they worked well with each other.

 

“It’s not very nice to run away.”

 

“And it’s not very nice to kidnap people.”

 

He shrugged, “we all have our flaws.”

 

“What do you want from me?” Michelle asked, Ruby was hanging her head now. And he still kept his gun up to her.

 

“I want what you have. Spider-man fucked up my life, and I have to fuck up his.”

 

“ _He_ didn’t fuck up your life. _You_ did. Don’t push the blame on others.”

 

“Oh well. He fucked up what I had planned.”

 

Michelle sighed and watched as the man moved closer, he put a hand on Ruby’s waist and pulled her close. “You worried me,” he murmured into her ear.

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“Sit down while Michelle and I talk, pumpkin.”

 

Ruby sat down on the couch and the man walked over to Michelle, smiling as he held a gun to her. “Let’s go to the kitchen, shall we?”

 

Michelle lead him to the kitchen, frowning and wishing that Nat and the others would hurry the hell up.

 

“Why are you doing this?” Michelle asked as she turned to him, the only light being the evening setting sun shining through the windows.

 

“I’m gonna let you in on a little secret, Michelle Jones,” he leaned forward. Michelle was severely aware he knew her name and she didn’t know his. Not even his alter egos name. “The world wants villains.”

 

Michelle must’ve looked confused because he kept talking.

 

“The human race craves drama, even if it's subconsciously. They want fights, they want ugly. because it distracts them on how fucked up their lives are. They don't want _peace_ , they want _entertainment_ . They want things to watch. that's why they love the Avengers so much, they're the good guys. When the Avengers are on the news, it means there is something worth watching. That's why they love people like me so much, people who _cause_ fights. The human race is the most morally fucked up race out there. They preach peace and love for planet earth, but they're the ones fucking up the earth. They're the ones who won't throw their trash away, the ones making deadly weapons, the ones starting wars and the ones living without any sense of humanity. Humans aren't good. No one is good. We're all a bunch of bastards who want more. Who want whatever we can get our hands on and more.”

 

Michelle stung, felt like she was hurt. Because the truth hurt. He wasn’t spewing crazy lies by some bad guy, he was telling the truth. He was being honest. He was saying out loud what most are scared to even _think._

 

“Why do you need me for that?” Michelle acquired, taking a step back into the kitchen counter.

 

“You’re my drama starter. When I kill you, your boyfriend will come looking for me. For vengeance.”

 

“So this is for attention?”

 

He smiled even wider, looking like some twisted Jack Nicholson Joker. “Now you’re getting it!”

 

“Were you born this fucked up?” Michelle nearly yelled. Anger boiled in her chest, her knees were locking and she was starting to lose feeling in her hands.

 

“Oh, sweetheart,” he took a step forward. “People aren’t born like this. They’re made like this over time.”

 

_“I know he is, Michelle, I know.”_

 

_“He should be here.”_

 

_“The world is cruel. But this is all part of a big plan, all of it. All this pain is just a pathway for the good to come.”_

 

He walks forward and brings his hand up to Michelle’s face, tugging on her hair.

 

He looks just like everyone else.

 

Like every other man who looked at her like she was something to be seen and not heard. Every man who touched her without asking. The one in the school hallway, the one who’s blood she still has in her mouth. The boss’s son, hiding something disturbing behind his smile at her. Flash, making a crude comment every time she was gone. The men on the street, howling at her to smile, for her to wear a dress every once and a while, for her to bat her eyelashes a little more.

 

“Any last words, Michelle?

 

Michelle stayed quiet, maybe this was the end. Maybe this is what she was made for. Maybe this… this is meant to be her last moments. She never went into the haunted houses with her aunt on Halloween. She never finished Stranger Things or Orange is the New Black. She never left the country, she never went to prom. She never got to visit Liz again, she never got to kiss Peter fully. She never got to graduate, never got to be published, never showed anyone that one piece of art she had been working on for years. Never got to be better, never got to say sorry to all the people she had wronged. Never got to be a true person. Michelle Jones never got to _live._

 

But, maybe, maybe this is how her Christmas story was supposed to end. Just like it began. With a sad, quiet song playing as Michelle cried gently.

 

“I really hope that you learn how to forgive yourself someday.”

 

His smiled twitched and he seemed to be fighting a frown. “I don’t need anyone’s forgiveness.”

 

_“Breathe, MJ, breathe.”_

 

_“Caleb, you’re gonna be gone soon.”_

 

_“I’m never gone. I’m always with you.”_

 

There was a loud scream. One that held so much pain and terror. Then two gunshots and everything went black.

 

_Michelle laughed despite the world crumbling around her and Caleb slowly fading into nothing. “That’s so cheesy.”_

 

_“And it’s true. I’m always with you. And it’s not your time to go. Not yet.”_

 

_“What?”_

 

_“It’s not your time. You have a life still.”_

 

_Pain. Pain. Pain. Screeching, loud, blaring and ringing, **pain.** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you all enjoyed! let me know what you think <33


	14. SO MANY PLACES, SO MANY THINGS, ALL AT ONCE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> y'all, i'm so sorry i didn't update sooner. i've been working on the ending and it makes me so sad to work on i've been putting it off, so i've been putting this story off. plus, i've had some teeth & school problems so my past few weeks have been filled with pain.  
> this isn't the last chapter, this gives some backstory to some OC's and such. i really enjoyed writing this chapter. i'm thinking of doing a few longer fics based off of beatrice & tony and others but idk. i'll decide later.  
> the next chapter should be up soonish. it'll take longer for me to write because it will be one of the final chapters. there might be an epilogue but i dunno yet.  
> i hope you enjoy this chapter! if you have any questions about it, comment them and i'll answer!

**_SIX YEARS EARLIER, PARIS, FRANCE_ **

 

“And what might your name be?”

 

Ruby turned around and looked at the owner of the voice. He was taller than her, wearing a suit and holding a brandy glass. His smile was flashy and had real joy behind it.

 

“I’m Ruby,” she answered. The party around them was loud and a mix of languages. Loud, classy music was playing. Most who weren’t drinking, sitting at small tables or out on the large balcony were dancing. “And you are?”

 

He smirked, taking her hand in his own and pulling Ruby to the dance floor, “call me Shawn.”

 

That was the first time he ever lied to Ruby.

 

“Why are you in Paris?” Shawn asked while they danced, Ruby wasn’t very good but it didn’t seem that Shawn minded.

 

“I’m here with my mother and her husband, they work at one of the companies. I forget which one,” Ruby talked quietly while they danced. “How about you? Why are you here?”

 

“Oh you know,” Shawn laughed, “a little of this. Little of that.”

 

Ruby smiled, and when he spun her around, she saw the look in his eyes. The look that Ruby wouldn’t see often, until she did.

 

It was… like he was looking at a challenge. Something to be conquered.

 

**_MAINE, 2006_ **

 

“I’m not going back,” Nina Pierce told the pastor. Her hair was short and her nails had mud under them, she was holding a backpack over one shoulder. “I’m just not.”

 

“You can’ be living in the basement of the church! Your mother _loves_ you, you have to go back home,” the pastor responded quickly, looking at the teenager in front of him.

 

“I don’t want to go back, I _can’t_.”

 

“You have to go back.”

 

“No. I don’t. And I’m not gonna.”

 

“Please, Nina. Go back home.”

 

Nina sighed and blew out air, she looked at the pastor who found her sleeping on a couch in the basement. The summer air salty and the sun unusually bright for so early in the morning. “Fine. I’ll go back.”

 

“Go inside now, I’m sure she’s been worried sick.”

 

Nina grumbled and sighed, opening the car door and slamming it too hard. She stood at the bottom of the wooden steps, the wrap around porch that she missed. Her backpack was heavy and full, her hair flying one way, messy and uneven from cutting it in the dim bathroom with child scissors. The front door still green, the screen door still polished, the house still large and elegant.

 

Nina walked up the steps slowly, looking back at the car still in the driveway. The pastor smiled as an encouragement.

 

Nina looked back at the car, the long driveway, the flowers, and spacious grassy front yard. The place beyond them, the place where she was still out of her mother’s grasp, still free and wild. Still alive. Truly alive.

 

Nina opened the screen door and kept it open with her hip, knocking on the green hardwood door. She heard someone wearing heels walk to the door, swinging it open with a smile that faltered when she saw the person at the door.

 

“Hi, mom,” Nina croaked against the wind. She noticed her mother’s eyes drift to the car in the driveway. The way her mother registered it all, falling to her knees to pull her daughter into a hug. Hiding her face in the dirty hair with split ends and jagged curls that stopped suddenly at her ears.

 

Her hands squeezed Nina’s shoulders tightly, enough to hurt if Nina wasn’t used to the abused like hugs she got from her mother, Ida Pierce soon to be Ida Davis when she married the man who she had supposedly fallen in love with.

 

The hugs were a form of abuse, reminding Nina of the motherly comfort Nina never earned from Ida.

 

“ _I should’ve turned my back on you like you were the bullet._ ” Her voice was chilling to the bone. Ida pulled back and smiled watery at her child, something in her eyes.

 

The look of victory. Of having the upper hand. Of winning.

 

**_1995, COLUMBUS, OHIO_ **

 

“Tammy!” A fist pounded on the apartment door. “Come on! I’m not letting you sit in sorrow all day!”

 

Tammy swung open the door and looked at her friend, Andrew. He was a year older than her, and Tammy had been in love with him since she shook his hand.

 

“You can’t stay in the house all day. C’mon, get dressed, we’re going out for ihop.”

 

“Ihop?”

 

“Yes, Ihop. You got something against Ihop?”

 

Tammy just laughed and shook her head, letting him in.

 

**_1997, NEW YORK CITY_ **

 

“He’s so tiny.”

 

Beatrice cradled the child in her arms, sleeping soundly. He was early, of course, he was. And he tiny. So tiny.

  
Tony sat on the bed with her, an arm around her shoulders and looking down at the newborn with her.

 

Beatrice looked exhausted. The dark circles under her eyes, her skin was stretched thin, her hair was a mess of curls and sweat. Her hands slightly shook, but she was looking down at the baby, her baby, with something Tony had never seen on her face.

 

“He has your eyes,” Tony said. He looked at Beatrice smiling, bringing his hand up and brushing some strands of hair out of her face. Beatrice smiled back at him, full and happy. Looking back at her son.

 

“He’s so beautiful,” Beatrice whispered. Her eyes softened when the baby yawned.

 

**_FOUR YEARS EARLIER, NEW YORK CITY_ **

 

“What the fuck!”

 

“Ruby, pumpkin, settle down. Please. It’s not what it looks like.”

 

Blood was everywhere. On his clothes, his face, in his goddamn hair. Ruby walked into their house at the wrong time, the look on Shawn’s face. That fucking _look._

 

“Bullshit. There’s blood everywhere and you’ve been acting weird as of late. What the fuck is going on, Shawn.”

 

After Shawn explained, she should’ve left. She really should’ve.

 

But Ruby went from living with her mother and going to college, to living with Shawn and living off of him. She hadn’t ever been on her own. She was helpless. She was so small.

 

So she stayed. She pretended to not wash blood out of Shawn’s clothes, pretended that everything was fine. She heard about Spider-man on the news, noticing how every time he was on the TV screen, Shawn’s fists clenched.

 

Ruby pretended that her boyfriend wasn’t killing people. Wasn’t wanted by the government and the fucking Avengers. Wasn’t on the news and didn’t have some type of screwed fire-hand powers. Ruby pretended.

 

Shawn walked in the house wearing a suit, he walked up to Ruby and wrapped his arms around her waist. Something deep inside of her moved away, screamed in warning.

 

“Hi, pumpkin, how was your day?”

 

Ruby shrugged and continued to do laundry. “It was fine.”

 

_It was fine. Everything between them was just that._

 

_Fine._

 

**_MAINE, 2007_ **

 

“Nina! Come meet my friend!”

 

“Mary, what the fuck, you made me get out of-”

 

The girl’s smile was brighter than anything Nina had ever seen. She reached out her hand for Nina to shake.

 

“I’m Wilsen Flores, it’s nice to meet you.”

 

Nina took Wilsen’s hand in her own, shaking it. There was something about her eyes.

 

It was more loving than anything Nina had ever seen. It was beautiful.

 

**_1995, COLUMBUS, OHIO_ **

 

“So,” Tammy started, pouring syrup on the plate of pancakes in front of her. “How have you been?”

 

“Well,” Andrew blushed, “I met a girl.”

 

Tammy dropped the container of syrup and swore she could hear her heart break.

 

“Oh?” She answered, wildly cleaning up the mess and dwelling over the now soggy pancakes.

 

**_1998, NEW YORK CITY_ **

 

“Did you do it?”

 

Tony didn’t respond. He was quiet, so was Beatrice. Beatrice was wearing pajamas, her son asleep in his room down the hall. Her boxes were already packed, scattered around the house, Tony refused to look at them.

 

“You did, didn’t you?”

 

Tony looked down, the summer heat whirling around them. Beatrice let out a strangled noise. Similar to a cry. She walked towards him, grabbing his hand in her own.

 

“I’m not mad at you,” Beatrice whispered. “I understand.”

 

“I’m sorry, Bea,” Tony sobbed out. He moved to bring a hand to the back of her neck. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

 

Beatrice shook her head, her hair was pulled back. Tony had woken up to see her on the balcony outside his room, looking at the moon. Her back was to him, shoulders shaking.

 

He realized it like that. Like a snap of fingers or a light switch flicking. She knew. Beatrice knew what he did.

 

“I don’t think what you did was okay. But I understand why you did it.” Her voice was watery and tears were falling out of her eyes. “I love you so much, Tony. you have no idea how much I love you.”

 

“I’m so sorry…”

 

Beatrice cupped his face in her hands, “I know you are, baby. I know.”

 

Beatrice shut her eyes and leaned their foreheads together. Warm tears falling on Tony’s face. “You know I’m still gonna go.”

 

Tony let out a sob, and looked away, “I know. I just wish- wish I wasn’t like this. To you, out of all people.”

 

Beatrice shook her head, over and over, opening her eyes to look at Tony. “No, no. Not at all. Tony, honey, look at me.”

 

Tony looked at Beatrice. Her. Light of life. “You are not a bad person, Tony. You’re an amazing person, you’re the love of my life. I love you. And you,” she said, pushing his sweaty hair out of his face. “You are not a bad person, Tony.”

 

**_TWO YEARS EARLIER, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA_ **

 

“Shawn!” Ruby yelled into the hollow house. The penthouse they were staying in. Ruby didn’t ask why, and she pretended not to notice how one of his suitcases went everywhere with him. Pretended not to notice how he came home smelling like ash, sweat, and iron.

 

“Shawn, you home?”

 

Ruby dropped her bag, went to the bedroom and walked to the closet. Originally when she walked in, she was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. But…

 

You make sacrifices for the ones you love. Sometimes it’s giving up smoking, sometimes drinking, sometimes it’s giving up everything you once were. Giving up your future job, your school, your fashion, and friends. Everything from the life you had before.

 

Ruby stripped her outfit and changed into the clothes she knew Shawn liked. Put on her heels and curled her hair. Put on the make up he liked. She changed for him.

 

“Pumpkin?”

 

“In the living room, Shawn!”

 

When he walked in, he had the look. That fucking look. The one he always had when he got home from the places that cut his arms and made him smell like blood.

 

“How was your day, pumpkin?”

 

Ruby shrugged, “it was fine. Nothing much happened. How was yours?”

 

“Oh, you know,” he said while walking to Ruby and kissing the back of her neck. “It was productive.”

 

The smell of blood still lingered on Shawn.

 

“That’s good,” Ruby smiled. “What would you like for dinner?”

 

“Oh, pumpkin,” Shawn laughed. “Whatever you want I’m good with.”

 

_They were fine._

 

_She was fine._

 

_It was all fine._

 

**_MAINE, 2014_ **

 

“Wilsen!” Nina laughed, “slow down!”

 

“We have to get to the party! You’re twenty-two today! Taylor Swift wrote a song about this day!”

 

“Wait, wait, wait! Wilsen!”

 

The girl holding Nina’s hand, whipped around to Nina herself. Panting slightly, she smiled at Nina. “what?”

 

“Wilsen,” Nina gasped. “We should get married.”

 

Wilsen’s eyes went big, her mouth went slightly agape. Then, she smiled widely. “Yes. Yes, yes. Let’s do it. _”_

 

Nina laughed and pulled her into a kiss. “I love you.”

 

“I love you too,” Wilsen said against her mouth.

 

**_1997 - PRESENT, COLUMBUS, OHIO_ **

 

The wedding was nice, Andrew cried when he saw his bride walk down the aisle. Tammy clenched her jaw and looked down. She pretended that the tears she was wiping was from the pure beauty of the wedding and not the loud cracking in her chest.

 

Unrequited love was something that happened all the time. But Tammy never thought it would happen to her.

 

Three weeks after the wedding, her aunt offered her a job at the coffee shop she owned in New York. Tammy looked at the framed photo of her and Andrew on her bookshelf, filled with Nicholas Sparks and other returned love romance books.

 

She took the job and was out of Ohio in two weeks.

 

She almost got married while living in New York, she recovered from a bad car accident and met a young kid named Michelle who drank the coffee Tammy made and loved sugar cookies.

 

Tammy had a life. She did. She had a new life in New York. But it could’ve been different.

 

**_1998, NEW YORK CITY_ **

 

“Beatrice?” Tony called out. There was no answer. “Beatrice?”

 

“Jarvis? Where’s Beatrice?”

 

“Ms. Valentine left the premises earlier this evening. Would you like me to contact her?”

 

Tony shook his head, he knew this was coming. He knew. It was bound to happen. “Nah, don’t worry about it J.”

 

Tony walked into her room, the one she shared with her son, her Atticus. It was empty. The window was doors to the balcony was open, the bed frame was there. There was no mattress, but it was there. You could tell the room was once lived in, but now it was just vacant and Tony was alone.

 

There was a book sitting in the windowsill, next to a vase filled with tulips Beatrice bought from the market the week prior.

 

Tony grabbed the book. It had a red cover, _On Love, Novel by Alain de Botton._

 

Inside there was a photo. Beatrice was beautiful. Tony walked out to the balcony and sat down on the abandoned furniture. He started to read the only thing Beatrice left.

 

**_NOW, FRANCINE JONES TOWNHOUSE_ **

 

Ruby moved frantically for the gun she put in the suitcase. Shawn was in the kitchen with Michelle, he was speaking.

 

They weren’t fine. They hadn’t been for a long time.

 

One of her old school friends warned her about him. Before Ruby dedicated her life to Shawn, her friend warned her.

 

_“He’s abusive, Ruby. He abuses you.”_

 

Ruby grabbed the gun with trembling hands. Hiding it behind her back, she walked slowly and silently to the kitchen.

 

_“He’s never hit me.”_

 

Shawn was talking in a weird way, his hair wasn’t like he normally styled it. He laughed, and Michelle was completely slient when the bullet left his gun and met her skin.

 

_“He doesn’t have to.”_

 

Shawn turned toward Ruby, his smile fell and his eyes widened panic. His gun falls to the floor with a loud crash and Michelle fells to the floor behind him.

 

“Pumpkin…” Shawn starts.

 

Ruby brings the gun up to him, Shawn, her lover, the bad guy, the villain. The iron blood.

 

“I… am not your pumpkin,” Ruby gritted out as the second gunshot that night rang out. She dropped the gun as her mouth fell open.

 

**_NOW, HERE AND THERE_ **

 

Ruby was shrieking. That was the only way to describe it. Shrieking.

 

The man, her man, the villain, was laying on the floor. Lifeless. On the floor next Ruby was a gun, Michelle realized she was on the floor. Blood was leaking from the man’s dead body next to her.  

 

The world around Michelle was swirling. Like the waves in the wave pool, pushing her under the water, forcing her to gasp for air. The light was dimming, sleep was overcoming her. It was all so tempting.

 

_“Michelle.” Caleb stood in the distance. His hair was longer now, he was wearing a beaded necklace that he bought from a charity a long time ago. The world around them was dark, he was the only thing in the light. Glowing, a watery blue, gleaming around him._

 

_“Michelle,” he said again. The world around them appeared dimly, like the blurry montage of a movie. It was all slurred, like it wasn’t real. Like it was a figment of her imagination._

 

_Maybe it was._

 

_Caleb moved closer, standing in front of her. The glowy hue following him, fading every few steps or so. Caleb looked tired. He looked like he was fighting a war._

 

_“I need you to let go.”_

 

_Michelle looked up at him, his body was covered in blood and gore but he wasn’t gone. Like he was an inch away from death._

 

_“I don’t understand,” Michelle spoke gently. “I’ve let go.”_

 

_“No,” Caleb shook his head. “You haven’t. And I need you to.”_

 

 _Michelle’s eyes watered and she looked away, only to realize that the only thing to look at was the_ _indistinguishable colors around her. Like seeing the world through tears. Red, yellow, green, traffic lights. The color of cars. The street, the faint noise of honking horns and music being blasted from cars in different lanes._

 

_“I can’t,” Michelle cried out softly. “I can’t.”_

 

_Caleb crouched down so he was shorter than her, his eyes sympathetic and worn out. “You can. I know you can. You’re the strongest person I know.”_

 

_“Caleb, I can’t. I don’t want to let go of you. I’m not ready for you to leave.”_

 

_“That’s not gonna work for me,” Caleb told her. “I wanna go. I’m tired too. I wanna stop fighting.”_

 

_Michelle sniffled and squeezed her eyes shut. Tears falling down her face._

 

_It was time. It was time to let go. It was time to end this neverending story. It was time to let go. She knew this. This was what she had to do. She had to let Caleb move on. She owed him that. Caleb deserved that. He deserved to go. To move on. To stop fighting._

 

_“I’m sorry that I made you go out that night. That I killed you,” Michelle stammered into the air._

 

_Caleb shook his head, he smiled fondly with teary eyes. “You didn’t do this. It wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t your fault, MJ.”_

 

_Michelle hugged him then, hiding her face in his neck. This was the end. This was goodbye._

 

_“I miss you so much,” Michelle sobbed out. “I wish it wasn’t like this!”_

 

_“I know, MJ. I know,” Caleb pulled back, keeping his hands on her shoulders and grinning in a melancholy way. “But you’re gonna get through this, alright? You’re not gonna leave like I did. You’re gonna survive. You’re gonna let go, of me, of this Christmas story, of all this bad.”_

 

_Michelle wiped her eyes and smiled even if her face wanted to frown. “You knew about the Christmas story?”_

 

_Caleb tucked a hair behind her face and cupped her cheek, nodding, he said, “it’s time for you to let go.”_

 

_Michelle looked down and nodded. Watching as Caleb stood up and grabbed her hand. The world went clear and Michelle understood now. The car started and Michelle looked at Caleb one last time._

 

_“I’ll see you in the next one,” he said, smiling. And Michelle swore that it was the same smile he gave her right before he left._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading! kudos and comments warm my heart! <333
> 
> edit - y'all, Michelle ain't dead. don't worry. she's alive, the scene with caleb is like a dream if you will. but she's alive. Michelle is alive.


	15. HALLELUJAH

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i've never been in a hospital for super serious reasons so i'm sorry if this sounds super stupid. i tried.

****_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

 

Michelle awoke to a bright room and a blurry waved TV on a stand that would be in an old 80s movie in the background playing some stupid cartoon with the sound off.

 

The lights were harsh, fluorescent. The room smelled like bitter chemicals, the walls were some weird mix of beige and green, and if she moves too much the monitors start a panicking beep. She was extremely aware of the ache in her shoulder. Michelle didn’t look at it. She knew what it was.

 

There was flowers by her bed, and she rolled her head to look around the room. Only to realize she wasn’t alone.

 

It was a boy, on the other side of the room. Sitting up in his bed and reading a book. He couldn’t even be twelve. His head was bald and his skin was a ghostly white. He must’ve realized Michelle was staring because he looked over at her, and smiled. Wide but stretched thin, like it pained his face to move his muscles to smile.

 

“Your parents were here, they left though. Visiting hours are over,” the boy croaked in a raspy voice. He paused, looked down at his book then back at Michelle. “What happened to you?”

 

“Well,” Michelle started, moving to sit up and lean against the million pillows that were on her stiff hospital bed. “I think I was shot.”

 

“Like, with a gun?”

 

Michelle nodded, “Mhm.”

 

“Are you okay?”

 

Michelle laughed, something in her chest ached. “I’m here, aren’t I.” It wasn’t a question.

 

“But, are you okay?” He asked, his eyes were sincere. He was still young enough to be sincere with wanting something from it. He was talking but wasn’t waiting for his turn. He wasn’t selfish in the way most were.

 

“You know, I’ve been better.” Michelle looked closer at Louis, he was wearing Batman pajamas. “How long have you been here?”

 

The boy shrugged, “too long.”

 

That hurt Michelle, a child. A real one, not a teenager that is legally a child but a real one. He was a fucking child and he was living in a hospital room.

 

“What’s your name?” Michelle asked, it was the least she could do. Soon she would be out of here, living the life she was meant to live but he would still be in this room like a flower that refused to grow.

 

“Sal,” he said. “My real name is Salvador but everyone calls me Sal.”

 

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Sal. I’m Michelle. But my friends call me MJ.” Michelle smiled at him softly.

 

“Can I call you MJ?”

 

“Is this your way of asking if we can be friends?”

 

Sal nodded.

 

“Of course you can call me MJ. And of course, we can be friends.”

 

Sal smiled and so did Michelle.

 

“What’re you reading there, Sal?” Michelle asked, pointing faintly at the book in his lap. Sal put his finger in the book to mark his page and showed Michelle the cover. “A Wrinkle in Time.”

 

“I read that one a while ago. Do you like it?” Michelle questioned, playing with the stiff blankets and struggling to get comfortable.

 

“I’m only a few pages in. I just started it,” Sal responded. “I can really get into it yet.”

 

“I can read it to you, if you want,” Michelle offered, reaching her hand out into the cold room for the book. Sal nodded and got out of his bed, walked over to Michelle with lanky arms and legs. Handing Michelle the chapter book and moving back to his bed. Michelle got comfortable and opened the front pages, starting at the beginning.

 

“ _It was a dark and stormy night…_ ”

 

Sal fell asleep a few chapters in, Michelle dogeared the book and set it on the nightstand thing next to her bed. She looked at the closed blinds, the rerun of some stupid cartoon and Sal sleeping across the room from her.

 

There were nurses that checked on them, gave them meds and food. The door was wide open so she saw people walk by, nurses, doctors, people in wheelchairs or people with broken arms. Kids holding hands with parents and mothers holding newly born babies.

 

Michelle listened to the shaky snores Sal let out, she read the subtitles on the TV screen. She watched the clock tick and tock, and went over the last few weeks obsessively. Anything to pass the never-ending hours of the time she was spending in this stupid hospital room.

 

When visiting hours started, Michelle was able to tell. Sal’s family showed up and smiled at Michelle, shaking her hand and asking her how she was feeling. She answered with a tired voice.

 

Her family came up, Cole, her parents, and Frankie. Frankie was selling her townhouse. Saying she couldn’t live in a house where an evil soul was roaming. They brought Michelle some books and Burger King. Michelle ate three burgers and downed a milkshake in five minutes. Hospital food was disgusting, sue her.

 

“Where’s Ruby?” Michelle asked after talking to her family for some time. Sal and his family weren’t in the room anymore, they left the room. Sal waved as he walked out.

 

“She’s been staying with Stark,” Frankie replied. “After Richard was killed, she refused to go back to her house. She’d like to visit you soon.”

 

“Is she okay?” Michelle implored. When no one answered, she pushed. “Is Ruby okay? That man- Richard- he did something to her.”

 

Cole sighed, reached over to pat her older sister’s clammy hand. With watery eyes, she spoke. “I think he did something to all of us.”

 

Her family stays past visiting hours, they watch a rerun of Modern Family on the wavy TV. Sal doesn’t come back until her family is packing up to go. His family smiles at hers, and their parents shake hands. When they leave, Sal and her are left alone.

 

“Who shot you, MJ?” Sal whispers into the dimly lit room. The only lights are the bright ones in the hallway and a small lamp between the two of them.

 

“A bad man,” Michelle answers. “A very bad man. He was evil. He hurt people because he wanted attention.”

 

Sal takes a shaky inhale of air, “was he a bully?”

 

Michelle shakes her head, “he was worse.”

 

Sal’s eyes go wide as he asks Michelle another question. “Where is he now?”

 

Michelle half shrugged, “he’s gone. All his bad decisions finally caught up to him.”

 

Sal asked if Michelle would keep reading A Wrinkle in Time to him, so she did. She put the book down when he fell asleep. Michelle watched the fuzzy TV on mute until her eyes couldn’t stay open anymore.

 

When Michelle woke up the next morning, Sal was laughing. Michelle looked over at him, to see Tony Stark playing go fish with him. Sal was now wearing Ironman pajamas. When Michelle looked at the other side of her bed, Ruby was sitting there reading a book in her lap.

 

“Ruby,” Michelle whispered, careful that Sal and Tony wouldn’t hear her. “Ruby!”

 

Ruby looked up and smiled at Michelle. She didn’t look like she did when they met. Her hair was pulled back in braids and she was wearing somewhat bizarre makeup. Her clothes looked more modern and comfortable. She looked happier.

 

“How do you feel?”

 

Michelle chuckled lowly, smiling as she sits up a tad. “Everyone keeps asking me that,” Michelle says. “But I feel fine. I little achy but all in all, fine.”

 

“I’m sorry about what he did to you,” Ruby speaks quietly. Her voice sounds like glass. “I didn’t… I didn’t know he would do that. I knew he was capable, I knew he could do that. But I never, I never thought he would do it to me. I never thought he’d let it affect us.”

 

Michelle grabs Ruby’s hand and squeezes it. “It’s not your fault, Ruby. You don’t need to say sorry.”

 

“MJ!” Sal exclaims looking up from his card game with Tony. “You’re awake!”

 

Tony smiles and spins to look at Michelle, “hey, kid. The Avengers send their love.”

 

Michelle nodded and smiled at him. Sal’s face was gleaming, it was dim because his face couldn’t get that bright, but it was gleaming. He was gleaming.

 

“Where’s Beatrice?” Michelle asked Tony, raising her eyebrows.

 

“She’s with her kids,” Tony said. “But she’s happy you’re alright.”

 

MIchelle smiled to herself, sometimes you know people care but it’s still nice to hear.

 

“Hey Ruby,” Michelle tosses out. They were all watching a rerun of Full House on the TV, every once and a while they would have a lull conversation. Talking in hushed voices and acting like the questions they asked each other were light when they both knew it wasn’t. Ruby hummed as a response, not yet looking at the teenager next to her.

 

“How did you and Richard meet?”

 

Ruby looked over at her, eyes confused and brows furrowed. Then something was pieced together. She sighs heavily. “Him. Well, for starters, he was Shawn to me. Shawn… and we met, we met in Paris like most movies,” Ruby laughed a little. But it was too quick and had a bite to it. “I was young, I was just out of college and was on a trip with my mother and her husband.”

 

Ruby took a deeper breath, “he saw me. No one had seen me in the way he did. Sure, I had some boyfriends and hidden kisses but no one had _seen_ me. No one had listened to me, or let me talk for hours on end. No one saw me as an adult in the way he did. And it was intoxicating. When people see you, _really_ see you, you’re drawn to them.”

 

“He loved me, I really do believe he did. But he was a bad person, a very bad person. And he deserved what he got.” Ruby ends quietly, her voice is firm and her eyes are painted with _something._ Michelle doesn’t answer, she goes back to watching Full House.

 

They stay quiet until Ruby says something. “I should’ve seen the signs.”

 

“No, Ruby,” Michelle shook her head. “ _He_ should’ve seen the signs.” Ruby grabs her hand and squeezes it, Michelle squeezes it back.

 

They listen to Michelle read A Wrinkle in Time until lunch hits then they leave, Ruby kisses Michelle’s clammy forehead and pushes Michelle’s curly bangs out of her face. Her face is soft and calm with something Michelle can’t explain, her eyes do not have the panic they had when Richard was around. They are calm, they are the sea after a storm.

 

“Was Ruby dating the man who shot you?” Sal asks, poking at his food.

 

Michelle takes a bite of her own food, “no. Not really. They were dating, but soon it was being trapped in a memory.”

 

Michelle takes a nap after lunch, her family will be back in a few hours. Sal left the room with a doctor, smiling as the doctor gave him a fistbump. Michelle listens as the footsteps walk down the hallway until they’re not hearable anymore.

 

Michelle is laying on her good side, and looking at the empty doorway, every once and a while someone comes by and looks at the teen with blank eyes laying under a wrinkled blanket. Everything around her is slightly muffled, hard to hear.

 

Michelle wonders what everyone she knows is doing right now. Mrs. Flores would be teaching, maybe. Working on her paperwork. Tammy would be refilling someone’s coffee and smiling softly. Frankie would be with Cole and Michelle’s parents. Maybe they would be getting ready to see Michelle, or talking to the police about what was going on. The police hadn’t come to Michelle yet, hadn’t talked to her. Ruby said that she talked to the police, but Tony was by her side the whole time with a lawyer.

 

Maybe Liz would be at school, or a job that she got a few weeks prior, she had been flirting with the owner's teenage son for a while now. Cindy and Betty were at school, her mother said that they wanted to visit too. May was at work, or maybe she was at home. Maybe she was watching the news and worrying about what Peter was doing. Maybe she was looking at the photo of Ben sitting in her living room. Beatrice was with her kids, her daughter was at school because it was a weekday so maybe she was with her son. Atticus. Maybe they were talking about a father he never had, a sister who he saw too little and a college he wasn’t happy at.

 

But Michelle didn’t know, all of these things were guesses.

 

Michelle swallowed something like a scream and rolled over to face the window. She couldn’t lay on her side, so she laid on her back and rolled her neck. It wasn’t snowing, but there was snow everywhere still. The New York skyline was beautiful, beautiful and Michelle had never noticed it.

 

On her sixth birthday, Michelle lost her two front teeth. She walked - well, _ran_ \- out of the car and fell onto the sidewalk curb. Her parents swear the screen was glass breaking. Swear the scream was something right out of a slasher movie.

 

Michelle doesn’t remember this. She goes over the memories she’s told that happened, the ones she was too young to remember, too young to realize that what she was experiencing was an actual part of life and it’d be gone soon. That soon, this would be nothing but a memory that she wouldn’t remember. A fleeting moment in time.

 

Like most things are now. Most are forgotten. How are you supposed to remember something when you’re not sure if you’re alive when it happens?

 

Michelle doesn’t remember the gun leaving the bullet.

 

She knows he laughed, knows Ruby saw it. Knows after the pain started he turned to Ruby. Knows Ruby was holding a gun in her hand, pointed at the ground. Michelle faintly, ever so faintly, remembers thinking _where_ Ruby got the gun. Why she had the gun. Where. Why. Where. Why-

 

When Michelle awoke, she realized it.

 

It hit her hard, it was the wave pool. Pushing her down under and gasping for air. The happiness was the women pulling her by her underarms and dragging her out of the water. Draping her in a towel or happiness, smiling with a rough edge.

 

She shut her eyes and opened them again. And again. And again. It was real.

 

Michelle Jones was no longer a Christmas story.

 

When she shut her eyes, she didn’t see the story. The Christmas story, her Christmas story, the one she had been living for sixteen years; was gone. There was no more dead Christmas lights or rotten Christmas trees. There was no more shattered porcelain villages or burning Christmas dinners. There were no more Christmas decorations or anything that showed the Christmas story had ever been there. It was all packed up in boxes. It was all in the abyss of her mind because it was over. She was past it. She moved on. She let go.

 

She was free. The winter was over, her Christmas story was over, and she made it out alive.

 

Michelle Jones made it out alive. She made it out alive. She repeated that sentence over and over again like a prayer, like a song stuck in your head. Michelle was alive, she was free and the never-ending Christmas story ended.

 

The spring was starting, flowers blooming and the sun making its way through the clouds. Everything was becoming brighter, the cool dark colors were slowly going into hiding. She didn’t have to bundle up anymore, she didn’t have to hide in blankets anymore and find light gleaming only from the kitchen lightbulb. She could go outside and enjoy herself. She could stand in the sun and soak up each and every ray of light.

 

Michelle could let herself be happy.

 

Sal is in his own bed and is sleeping, his face was sunken in. Like he just got back from hell. Michelle doesn’t wake him up, she wonders how long he has left. If he’s in pain. If he’s scared.

 

Because she is.

 

It terrified her. It did. How do you find happiness in a world that you were born to be sad in? How do you break the curse you were born into? How do you put down the blade when you were a natural born killer?

 

How do you forget the pain but remember the memory?

 

Michelle falls asleep again because she’s tried. Days are long. Nights are longer. Time warps when you have what she has. She was weaned off her meds and put on different ones so she wouldn’t get a toxic cocktail or something. It’s fine, it’s whatever. But she is _really_ starting to hate the hospital.

 

Michelle has a dream this time, not really a dream. But it’s close enough. It’s more like a fictionalized memory.

 

_In this one, in this one, Michelle was younger. And there were no gunshots. There was no Ruby and Shawn or Richard or whatever his name was. There was no Peter, or Tony or Beatrice. No anyone or anything. Just an empty kitchen, smoke a hazy yellow with the disgusting and shining overhead light._

 

_The kitchen was on fire, as was most things._

 

_Michelle walked out of the kitchen, into a living room. Faded flora couches and an old box TV plays nothing but static. Nothing but noise. Pointless noise._

 

_There are boxes stacked against a wall where a front door would be. All of them are labeled. Ornaments, decor, Christmas tree, wreaths, careful, fragile. Michelle walks towards all of them and lets her fingertips run over them. Her hand is smaller, fatter fingers and short stubby nails with messy cuticles._

 

_She blinks, and her hand is how it looks now. Longer fingers and chipping blue nail polish. She was older now. Her correct age._

 

_The fire moves closer, the TV explodes and Michelle doesn’t duck for cover. The couches flicker with flames. Michelle turns and watches it all. She’s next, it’s gonna end, there is no happy ending, she was always a Christmas story-_

 

_The door behind on all the boxes swings open, all the boxes fall down around Michelle like a meteor shower._

 

_Someone touches her shoulder, a polished rock lands in her hand. A familiar voice speaks._

 

**_“You’re my star.”_ **

 

When Michelle snaps her eyes open, there is no Christmas story in her real world and Sal is throwing wadded up paper at her. “MJ,” he dragged out the word.

 

Michelle mumbled something in response but it was muffled because her face was in her pillow.

 

“MJ!”

 

Michelle rolled her head and looked at Sal. He looked even more tired than he normally did. “Read to me?”

 

Michelle sighed and nodded, reaching for A Wrinkle in Time. Opening the book and watching as Sal got comfortable, shifting in his bed and breathing becoming cooler. His eyes followed her and looked as she started reading. He paid attention like no other. Michelle hoped Sal would have more time.

 

“How are you feeling, Ms. Jones?” the doctor’s voice was loud compared to the way everyone else had been talking to her in the last few days. She didn’t even know how long she had been in the hospital.

 

“Fine,” Michelle answered. “Tired. What day is it?”

 

“Friday, you’ve been here since early Wednesday morning.” The doctor was holding a clipboard and his voice was shrill. Nails against a chalkboard. Loud. He might’ve taken her blood, or told her to sit up, made her listen to him with little patience. But she was stuck, she was in that phase between awake and sleep. Between being alive and being dead. Between now and then.

 

“When can I go home?”

 

The doctor looked up at her with raised brows, “not for a while now. Sorry, kid.”

 

There was a reason for this, Michelle thought. A reason for the coolness this doctor was giving her. Michelle knew this. That doctors shouldn’t get attached, should stay distant. Should drift in and out of a patients day like a breeze. Michelle watched from her bed as the doctor wrote things down, did as she was told. Sat up and stood, stretched as the doctor wrote more down, bones cracking and head spinning from lack of movement.

 

The doctor walked out without another word. Footsteps echoing down the hallway.

 

The flowers by her bed were gone now, her parents had taken them back to the house. Michelle sat up in her bed, throwing her feet over the side of the bed. The hospital gown wasn’t what she read about, wasn’t what she was told it was going to feel like in all the books that took place in treatment fidelity, in hospitals, in places where people were supposed to heal.

 

Michelle walked out of the room that she had been confined in for a while now, her legs growing goosebumps from the cold floor, her arms wrapping around herself protectively. She walked down the hallway, dodging doctors and people that would drag her back to the room.

 

She walked around, finding herself in a breakroom. There was a large TV and a ping-pong table. Beaten up couches and cheap lawn chairs that parents would bring to kids soccer games. An old arcade game, there was someone in scrubs drinking a Diet Coke and reading a newspaper. “Go away.”

 

“What?”

 

The person turned around, short reddish hair and dark, dark eyes. “Why aren’t you in bed, kiddo?”

 

Michelle shrugged, looking at the TV. It was nicer than the one in her room, flatscreen. It was playing an episode of _Wheel of Fortune._ “I was bored.”

 

“Bored?”

 

Michelle nodded. The person, maybe a woman, stood up. Reaching their hand out for Michelle to shake, “I’m Ellie.”

 

“I’m MJ- Michelle.”

 

The woman smiled, something kind and warm. “Let’s get you back to your room, okay?”

 

Ellie made Michelle sit in a wheelchair, she pushed her down the hallway and talked to Michelle lightly. Personally. Like there was nothing else she had to do. Like there was no one else there.

 

“How old are you?”

 

“Sixteen.”

 

“What school do you go to?”

 

“Midtown.”

 

“Favorite song?”

 

“I like anything by The Smiths.”

 

“That’s not what I asked. What’s your favorite song?”

 

“Hallelujah. My dad used to sing it to my sister and I back when we shared a room. He doesn’t anymore.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“I’m not sure.”

 

“Maybe you should ask him to sing to you again.”

 

“Maybe.”

 

When they rolled into the room, Sal still wasn’t in there. Ellie pulled the sheets back and helped Michelle get back into bed, tucking Michelle in like a parent would do to a child. She pushed the wheelchair out in the hallway, another doctor or nurse took it. Ellie sat down in the chairs next to Michelle’s bed. Laying her feet on the side of her bed. She grabbed a clipboard at the edge of her bed.

 

“You were shot?”

 

Michelle nodded, leaning shifting her head to look at Ellie. “Yeah.”

 

“How come?”

 

“I was kidnapped.”

 

Ellie cocked her head. “Is there a reason for that?”

 

“I was at the wrong place, wrong time.”

 

“No such thing. Something made you go there.”

 

Michelle shrugged, “a friend of mine was in trouble.”

 

Ellie nodded. “Are they okay?”

 

“Yeah, he’s okay.”

 

“Tell me something no one else knows.”

 

“Sometimes I forget my age. Like… people will ask me how old I am and I’ll tell them I’m two or three years younger than I really am. It’s stupid, I know. But…”

 

“It’s not stupid. It’s just something that happens.”

 

Ellie put down the clipboard and grabbed one of the books off the stand by Michelle’s bed. Flipped through it, and looked back up at Michelle. “You need some sleep, MJ.”

 

“I’ve already slept too much.”

 

“That’s a bullshit excuse. Why won’t you sleep?”

 

“I’m scared,” Michelle choked down a sob. How could a mood change so quickly? How could everything change so quickly?

 

“Life is scary. But you’ll be fine. Gunshots heal. Bodies heal,” Ellie leaned forward and patted Michelle’s clammy hand. “You’ll heal.”

 

“What if I don’t?”

 

“You will. Even your charts say so.”

 

Michelle chuckled slowly. Her eyes were still rimmed with tears, her shoulder still ached, her throat still was dry, her Christmas story was still over.

 

“So, you’re gonna go to bed now, okay?”

 

Michelle shuffled deeper into her sheets, into her bed. Ellie started to sing softly, Hallelujah lyrics falling from her fingertips.

 

“ _Well_ _I’ve heard there was a secret chord,_

_That David played and it pleased the lord_

_But you don’t really care for music, do you?_

_Well it goes like this:_

_The fourth, the fifth, the minor fall and the major lift_

_The baffled king composing Hallelujah.”_

 

Michelle fell into a sleep, deep and dreams she wouldn’t ever remember.

 

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

 

She woke up and the room was empty, Ellie was gone. Leaving nothing but the song Hallelujah stuck in Michelle’s head. Sal wasn’t across the room, his bed was made and all his books and toys and games that were by his bed were organized onto the nightstand by his bed. The TV was gone, the room quiet. The windows were closed. Everything seemed dark. She realized later, that she never would see Ellie again.

 

“MJ?”

 

Michelle rolled over at the open door, Peter, fucking Peter, was standing in the doorway. His lip busted and black eye looking more healed. He was wearing joggers and a sweater, his hair wild and looking at Michelle curiously. He still looked beautiful. He always did.

 

“What are we?”

 

“ _What?_ ”

 

“What are we? Are we dating? Are we friends? What are we?”

 

Michelle fell back against her pillow, shutting her eyes and breathing deeply. “I don’t know.”

 

Peter was quiet.

 

“What do you want us to be, Peter?”

 

“Together.” His voice was agonizing and so withdrawn Michelle’s heart felt like splitting and breaking out of its ribcage jailcell and past Michelle’s thin skin, out into the real world. Presenting itself for Peter Parker.  

 

“Can’t we just be… us?” Michelle rasped to Peter. The constant beeping, tubes, and pipes in her skin, needles, shots, drinking things and having a certain diet. Waking up every two hours because of the man’s smile at her, Ruby frowning and Caleb’s eyes bleeding. Blood was everywhere. Her house, her story, went on fire in every dream. It didn’t matter what the dream _was_ about. It lit up and was on fire.

 

(She wanted to warn him, she really did. About the nightmares, going to bed early and waking up late in the afternoon. About the way her Christmas story was over, and it was the start of something new. Something she didn’t know. The way everything just disappeared all at once, how one second she was making the dinner. Decorating the tree. Plugging in the lights. Doing all these things, and then, and then, and then-

 

And then it was all gone. The whole story, everything. It was just _gone._ The winter was over. The thing she had wanted more than anything. But what was she supposed to do now? What was she supposed to do in the time between the end of winter and the beginning of spring? What was she supposed to be? How was she supposed to live without the Christmas story holding her in the place she needed to be?

 

She was the kid that couldn’t go into the homemade haunted houses. She was the kid that sat under the bleachers during gym. She was the kid that once broke down in tears during student read aloud because she couldn’t pronounce a long word. She was the kid that fell asleep on the living room floor because she felt she didn’t deserve her bed. She was the one that bought pepper spray the day after her twelfth birthday. She was the one, the one, the one who forgot to live when she was alive.)

 

Peter smiled slightly, bright and unmoving. He reached for her hand and ran his thumb through her palm.

 

“Yeah,” Peter whispered to Michelle. “We can just be us.”

 

She was still recovering but so was he. They weren’t ever going to be the same as they were four days ago. But that’s okay.

 

They were going to be okay.

 

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah_

 

(Michelle Jones Christmas story was over. It was over but she wasn’t.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading!! kudos and comments warm my heart!!


	16. THE FINAL

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the end. thank you all for coming on this journey with me. i could not have done this with your constant support. i love you all so much. there will be new stories out soon. but this is the end of Will You Be Home For Christmas. i've cried more than once while writing this, i've screamed and yelled and cried and worked hard on a story i hope you all can relate to in some way. worked hard on a story that you can all enjoy. thank you for reading. thank you for being there.
> 
> this is for you, whoever you are. this is for you and your own Christmas story.

**TWO YEARS LATER**

 

It is June, and they’re graduating. 

 

College doesn’t matter, well it does, but not when it comes to Michelle and Peter. They’ll get through it, they got through the guns and the bad. The crying and the Christmas story. The anxiety and depression. They got through it, and they always will. 

 

They are opposites, but they’re inevitable. And they’re strong. They’ll get through it.

 

Ruby opened a hair and makeup salon. Cole worked there sometimes, answered the phone and set up appointments. Ruby said she would do Michelle’s hair for free, but she always paid. Always. 

 

“Do you ever miss him?” Michelle asked two months after she was shot, after Shawn- Richard- was shot, after everything went down. 

 

Ruby rinsed Michelle’s hair, wrapped it in a towel. Helped Michelle stand up and lead her away from the sink and to the chair. Took out the hair dryer. “All the time.”

 

“Really?”

 

Ruby nodded and unwrapped the towel from Michelle’s hair. “Of course I do. I was in love with him. Or a version of him.”

 

“Huh.”

 

“Near the end,” Ruby started. She didn’t talk about him that much, only ever when asked about it. Even then, the chances of getting a real answer were slim. “I think I was mistaking familiarity with happiness.”

 

Michelle didn’t have a response. There was nothing she could say. But Ruby smiled more, she wore more makeup and had a whole new wardrobe. She seemed happier, even if a part of her life was permanently stained.

 

It is June, and they’re graduating.

 

Beatrice and Tony didn’t get married. And they didn’t call each other  _ boyfriend  _ and  _ girlfriend  _ like teenagers did, or like they did twenty years ago in 1997. They were just…  _ together.  _ And that was enough.

 

“Tones, baby, I love you but if you steal one more of my damn fries, I  _ will _ dump my drink on you,” Beatrice said it in something like an annoyed tone but she was smiling wide and looking at Tony like he was the only thing in the room. 

 

Tony picked another fry from her paper plate. “I love you.”

 

Beatrice smiled and looked down at the glass table they were eating at in the lab, Michelle was standing behind them. Looking for Peter but she stumbled across Beatrice and Tony…

 

“I love you too.”

 

Tony leaned and gently hit his forehead against her shoulder, then he looked up at her. “You should move in.”

 

“Tony…”

 

“I love you. And you already practically live here.  _ Please _ ?”

 

Beatrice sighed and brought a hand to the back of his neck. Pulling their foreheads together. “You shouldn’t give me the puppy eyes. It’s not fair.”

 

Tony kissed Beatrice and smiled. “You’re amazing.”

 

“You say that all the time.”

 

“It’s because it’s always true,” Tony answered and wrapped an arm around Beatrice. She leaned into the touch like it was instinct. Like it was something she always did. “I love you, Bea.”

 

“I know,” Beatrice laced their fingers together, bringing his hand up to her lips and kissing his knuckle. “I love you too. You’re amazing. You’re my favorite.”

 

Tony kissed the top of Beatrice’s head. Murmuring something that Michelle couldn’t hear.

 

Michelle could ask Nat or Steve where Peter was, she didn’t want to ruin such a quiet and delicate moment. Something timeless.

 

It is June, and they are graduating. 

 

When Michelle came back to school, Flash, fucking Flash, made a comment.

 

“Penis, tell your girlfriend to shut the fuck up.”

 

Michelle didn’t punch him, nor did Peter or Ned. It was a new girl. Smart, funny, blonde and always wore cool earrings. 

 

Her fist hit Flash’s face before anyone saw it coming. Flash’s lip was started bleeding too quickly. 

 

She smiled at them warmly and waved, “I’m Gwen.”

 

Cindy was gone for Gwen the first time Gwen smiled at her. Cindy and her whole gay ass were just  _ gone _ .

 

It is June, and they are graduating. 

 

Mrs. Flores came to Michelle’s graduation party. She wore a sundress and held hands with Wilsen nearly the entire time they were there.

 

“I’m so proud of you, Michelle,” Mrs. Flores said as she pulled back from a hug. “You are going to do the most amazing things.”

 

Michelle definitely did  _ not _ cry. 

 

“You’re going to send me postcards, okay? You’re not going to forget about me, Michelle.”

 

Like Michelle could ever forget about Mrs. Flores. 

 

“I can’t wait to see what you’ll do. You’re going to change worlds, Michelle.  _ Worlds. _ ”

 

It is June, and they’re graduating.

 

Sal dies when he’s fourteen. Michelle visited him at least once a week, they finished A Wrinkle in Time. Then they read A Wind in the Door, then A Swiftly Tilting Planet. Then Sal got bored with the series and they started Land Of Stories. They were halfway through the fifth book when he passed away. In his sleep. It was painless. Instantly. Fuck that.

 

There was pain. There was pain. There was always going to be pain. But that was a part of life. That was something Michelle would live through. It happened to every human.

 

It is June, and they’re graduating.

 

Her parents cry at graduation, Cole and Frankie do too. It’s strange, to see all these people crying over her success. 

 

Michelle has a dream the night before graduation, where Caleb told Michelle that he was proud of her. That she was going to be okay. That she was still alive and he loved her. That he was always with her.

 

It is June, and they’re graduating. 

 

And Michelle walks across the stage. Her family is watching, her friends, strangers and everything she knew. They’re watching as she made. She made it through high school alive. She told Liz she couldn’t see herself doing it, but  _ now.  _ She did it. 

 

She’s much taller in heels than Peter but he still lifts her off the ground. He still kisses her messily and smiles so bright it rivals the sun. 

 

They still had problems, they all did. Every person she met along the way, every person in her Christmas story and every person out of it.

 

But it’s June, and they’re graduating. 

 

And they made it. They love each other, and they made it.

 

That’s all that matters. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading. i love you. and i'll see you soon. i promise

**Author's Note:**

> hope you all enjoyed this! xx
> 
>  


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